2006 Winter Paralympics

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IX. Winter Paralympics
Paralympics logo
Spirit in motion
Venue: ItalyItaly Turin
Opening ceremony: March 10, 2006
Closing ceremony: March 19, 2006
Opened by: Carlo Azeglio Ciampi
(President of Italy)
Olympic oath : Fabrizio Zardini
Olympic torch : Silvia Battaglio and Aroldo Ruschioni
Countries: 39
Athletes: 486 (385 men, 101 women)
← Salt Lake City 2002
Vancouver 2010 →
Medal table
space country gold medal Silver medal Bronze medal total
1 RussiaRussia Russia 13 13 7th 33
2 GermanyGermany Germany 8th 5 5 18th
3 UkraineUkraine Ukraine 7th 9 9 25th
4th FranceFrance France 7th 2 6th 15th
5 United StatesUnited States United States 7th 2 3 12
6th CanadaCanada Canada 5 3 5 13
7th AustriaAustria Austria 3 4th 7th 14th
8th JapanJapan Japan 2 5 2 9
9 ItalyItaly Italy 2 2 4th 8th
10 PolandPoland Poland 2 0 0 2
Complete medal table

The IX. Winter Paralympics took place from March 10th to 19th, 2006 in Turin , the capital of the Italian region of Piedmont . It was the first Paralympic Winter Games in Italy.

Logo, mascot and slogan

The official logo shows three connected ice crystals above the logo of the International Paralympic Committee and the writing "Torino 2006 - Paralympic Games", which are very similar to those of the logo of the Olympic Winter Games 2006 , but in this case are in a total of three different colors (from left to right: carmine red , yellow green and blue ).

The official Olympic mascot is called Aster . This is female and has a body in the shape of a star-shaped snow crystal. With the mascots of the 2006 Winter Olympics, Neve and Gliz , Aster forms a trio , clearly recognizable by the very similar facial features of the three figures.

The motto of the Paralympic Winter Games in Turin was: Spirit in motion , which translated into German means spirit in motion .

Competition venues

The sports of alpine skiing, cross-country skiing and biathlon were held in Sestriere and Cesana San Sicario .

Sledge ice hockey and curling took place in Turin and Pinerolo .

The two Paralympic villages were in Turin and Sestriere.

Attendees

39 nations were registered in Turin. This is three nations more than at the 2002 Winter Paralympics . The North American state of Mexico was the only one of the participating nations that had not previously been represented by one or more athletes at the 2006 Winter Olympics. (In brackets: number of participating athletes)

Participating nations:
- Green: <5 participants;
- Blue: 5–9 participants;
- Orange: 10–19 participants;
- Red:> 19 participants.

Sports, schedule and results

2006 Winter Paralympic Schedule
March 10. 11. 12. 13. 14th 15th 16. 17th 18th 19th
Ceremonies
biathlon • •
Wheelchair curling •
Sledge ice hockey •
Alpine skiing • • • • • • • •
Cross-country skiing • • • • •
March 10. 11. 12. 13. 14th 15th 16. 17th 18th 19th
• = medal decisions

Events

Opening ceremony

The opening ceremony lasted about an hour and a half and was held in front of around 26,000 spectators. Among the highlights of the performance of the racer and former belonged to Formula 1 pilots Alex Zanardi . The leg amputee gave an emotional speech in which he enthusiastically challenged the athletes to top performance.

In the opening ceremony, barriers were symbolically torn down, for example when a female archer in a wheelchair used a bow and arrow to destroy an oversized ascending staircase that represented such a barrier.

At exactly 7:12 p.m. the games were officially opened by the Italian President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi .

The Olympic oath was pronounced by the Italian athlete Fabrizio Zardini . The President of the International Paralympic Committee , Sir Phillip Craven , also spoke and praised the hosts. He emphasized the importance of the Paralympics and spoke out clearly against doping in his speech .

Web links