Ultimate Guide to the Winter Olympics

The Winter Olympics are here. We watched the opening ceremonies, and it is incredible to see how many athletes compete in these games. 92 different countries are competing. Some are represented by only one athlete, whereas the US has 244! That’s the largest group sent in Olympic history.

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There are 15 different sports with a total of 102 events. There are four new events this year, including Snowboarding Big Air, Freestyle Skiing Big Air, Speedskating Mass Start, and Curling Mixed Doubles. What are all of these different sports?

The 15 different sports (in alphabetic order) are:

ALPINE SKIING
Alpine Combined Men/Women, Downhill Men/Women, Slalom Men/Women, Super Combined Men/Women, Super-G Men/Women, Parallel Mixed Team Event
BIATHLON
7.5km Women, 10km Men, 15km Women, 20km Men, 12.5km Pursuit Men, 10km Pursuit Women, 15km Mass Start Men, 12.5km Mass Start Women, 4x6km Relay Women, 4×7.5km Relay Men, Mixed Relay, Single Mixed Relay
BOBSLEIGH (or BOBSLED)
Monobob Men/Women, Two-Man Men/Women, Four-Man Men
CROSS COUNTRY SKIING
10km Women, 15km Men, 30km Women, 50km Men, 4x5km Relay Women, 4x10km Relay Men, Sprint 1.5km Men/Women, Cross-Country Cross Free Men/Women, Team Sprint Men/Women, 7.5km + 7.5km Skiathlon Women, 15km + 15km Skiathlon Men
CURLING
Men/Women, Mixed Doubles
FIGURE SKATING
Individual Men/Women, Ice Dancing Mixed, Mixed NOC Team Mixed, Pairs Mixed
FREESTYLE SKIING
Aerials Men/Women, Halfpipe Men/Women, Moguls Men/Women, Ski Cross Men/Women, Slopestyle Men/Women
ICE HOCKEY
Men/Women
LUGE
Doubles Men, Singles Men/Women, Doubles Mixed, Mixed Team Relay
NORDIC COMBINED
Individual Ski Jumping K90 Men, Sprint K120 Men, Team 4x5km Men, Nordic Mixed Team NH 3×3.3km
SHORT TRACK SPEED SKATING
1000M Men/Women, 1500M Men/Women, 500M Men/Women, 3000M Relay Women, 5000M Relay Men
SKELETON
Individual Men/Women
SKI JUMPING
K120 Individual Men, K120 Team Men, K90 Individual Men/Women, Mixed Team
SNOWBOARD
Giant Parallel Slalom Men/Women, Half-Pipe Men/Women, Parallel Slalom Men/Women, Slopestyle Men/Women, Snowboard Cross Men/Women, Team Ski-Snowboard Cross
SPEED SKATING
10000M Men, 1000M Men/Women, 1500M Men/Women, 3000M Women, 5000M Men/Women, 500M Men/Women, Mass Start Men/Women, Team Pursuit Men/Women, Mixed NOC Team Sprint

So what exactly are these events? Do you have a favorite? I have always loved figure skating. I dreamed of becoming a figure skater when I was growing up, but I didn’t have the grace for it. I’m content with watching it. I was even fortunate enough to see Stars on Ice once. Seeing it in person is better than watching it on tv.

I also like watching the bobsledding. I loved watching the movie Cool Runnings about the Jamaican bobsledding team. Such an inspirational story. Did you know that this year there is a women’s bobsledding team from Nigeria? How awesome is that?

I’ve compiled some books about each of the different sports. Click on a book cover for more details from Amazon.