[ad_1]
Hosts: Beijing, China Dates: 4-20 February |
Protection: Watch stay on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Purple Button and on-line; pay attention on BBC Radio 5 Dwell and BBC Sounds; stay textual content and highlights on BBC Sport web site and cell app |
The Beijing Winter Olympics got here to a detailed on Sunday in a touching ceremony.
Nearly 3,000 athletes competed in 109 occasions throughout 15 disciplines through the previous two weeks.
Worldwide Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach known as for political leaders “around the globe” to be impressed by the athletes’ “instance of solidarity and peace”.
“This unifying energy of the Olympic Video games is stronger than the forces that wish to divide us,” he mentioned.
Bach mentioned the athletes had “given peace an opportunity,” along with his feedback coming amid rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
“Each one in every of you strived to attain your private finest. We had been deeply touched the way you had been wishing and cheering in your rivals to attain their finest as properly,” he mentioned.
“You not solely revered one another: you embraced one another, even when your nations are divided by battle.”
Bach additionally inspired nations to proceed vaccinating in opposition to Covid-19, saying: “If we wish to lastly overcome this pandemic, we have to be sooner.
“We should purpose increased, we have to be stronger, we should stand collectively. Vaccination means caring for one another.
“On this Olympic spirit of solidarity, we name on the worldwide group: give equal entry to vaccines for everyone around the globe.”
Nice Britain go away Beijing with two medals – gold within the ladies’s curling and silver within the males’s occasion.
Curling skip Bruce Mouat, who led the boys’s rink, was the flagbearer for Crew GB on the closing ceremony.
The Olympic flame was extinguished, with the following Video games happening in Milan-Cortina in Italy in 2026. The Winter Paralympics begins in Beijing on 4 March.
Valieva saga overshadows Video games
The Beijing Video games had been engulfed by the controversy surrounding Russian determine skater Kamila Valieva and {the teenager}’s failed drug check.
The constructive check got here to mild after the Russian Olympic Committee received gold within the group determine skating, with the 15-year-old changing into the primary lady to land a quadruple soar at an Olympic Video games.
Nevertheless, the medal ceremony was delayed, with it coming to mild that Valieva had examined constructive for a banned drug used to forestall angina assaults.
After a sequence of appeals and re-appeals, Valieva was allowed to compete within the remaining particular person occasions, nevertheless it has led to questions about her teaching group and the equity of youngsters competing in Olympic occasions, notably as she crumbled in her remaining occasion.
Not one of the podium athletes from the occasion have acquired their medals, with the IOC asking the World Anti-Doping Company (Wada) to research the constructive end result.
“Each athlete needs a good enjoying subject and we additionally wish to shield the well being and psychological well being of athletes,” two-time Olympic champion Lizzy Yarnold mentioned on BBC TV.
“The largest factor I’ve realized is remembering athletes are people. We have to shield our younger athletes.”
There have been moments of brightness. Norway will go away Beijing with a report 16 gold medals and 37 in complete, having dominated within the snow.
China’s 18-year-old Eileen Gu grew to become one of many stars of the Video games with gold within the huge air and halfpipe, whereas snowboarder Shaun White closed his profession on the slopes.
The largest sporting shock was America’s Mikaela Shiffrin, a heavy pre-Video games favorite to scrub up within the snowboarding occasions. She crashed out of three of her finest occasions and didn’t handle to seize a medal within the others.
Whereas the Video games have been a hit for China, who secured their finest Winter Olympics medal haul, questions over human rights abuses and the security of tennis participant Peng Shuai that dominated the build-up to the competitors stay.
Blended feelings for Crew GB
That is Nice Britain’s lowest medal complete since 2010, the place they received a sole gold within the ladies’s skeleton.
UK Sport set a goal of three to seven medals however there have been quite a lot of near-misses and disappointment within the sliding occasions, making it the primary time since 2002 that Britain have did not win a skeleton medal.
Snowboarder Charlotte Bankes, 2018 skeleton bronze medallist Laura Deas and alpine skier Dave Ryding had been among the many medal hopes, however struggled for rhythm and type in Beijing.
Britain’s first medal of the Video games got here on Saturday within the males’s curling, earlier than Eve Muirhead’s rink claimed gold on the ultimate day.
Sally Munday, the chief government of UK Sport, mentioned the “biggest progress can come if we actually study from disappointment”.
“I additionally know that while the final 24 hours has created actual pleasure, there are a selection of our athletes who will go away Beijing disenchanted,” Munday wrote.
“While there have been some memorable performances, many didn’t obtain the outcomes they got here for and no-one will likely be extra disenchanted than the athletes themselves.
“We at all times knew that Beijing 2022 can be a problem like nothing that they had beforehand skilled.
“We additionally know that the jeopardy that makes sports activities on snow and ice such a compelling spectacle for these of us watching can also be a recipe for uncertainty. This undeniably performed its half in stopping a few of our medal hopes from attaining their goals.”
[ad_2]
Source link