| Hosts: Beijing, China Dates: 4-20 February |
| Coverage: Watch stay on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Red Button and on-line; Listen on BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Sounds; stay textual content and video clips on BBC Sport web site and cell app. |
The Winter Olympics is upon us and this is your day-by-day guide to all of the motion in Beijing.
The sporting programme features a report 109 events over 15 disciplines in seven sports activities.
Team GB, consisting of fifty athletes, will take part in 11 of the disciplines.
All occasions are GMT and events are topic to change.
Sunday, 6 February – day two
Medal events: 7
Alpine snowboarding (males’s downhill), cross-country snowboarding (males’s skiathlon), freestyle snowboarding (girls’s moguls), luge (males’s singles), snowboard (girls’s slopestyle), ski soar (males’s regular hill), pace skating (males’s 5,000m)
Highlights
The males’s downhill, which kicks off alpine snowboarding in Beijing (03:00), brings a uncommon phenomenon: a course on which no person has gained. No take a look at events have been held at this newly designed slope due to the pandemic, so it could possibly be the fairest downhill race in historical past as everybody shall be ranging from scratch. Aksel Lund Svindal, who gained gold in 2018, has since retired, though the downhill race – a simple pace take a look at – could possibly be gained in Beijing by one other Norwegian, Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, who has dominated the World Cup circuit this season.
American Jamie Anderson will bid for a 3rd snowboard’s girls’s slopestyle ultimate (01:30) however be careful for New Zealand’s Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, who simply gained X Games slopestyle gold in Aspen and was the main qualifier for the 12-woman ultimate.
Brit watch
Cross-country’s males’s skiathlon was the occasion wherein Andrew Musgrave completed seventh at Pyeongchang 2018, his finest Olympic efficiency and Britain’s finest end result within the sport. In Beijing, he informed the BBC he wants a “ridiculously good day” to get a medal however “on the similar time, there’s a risk”. Andrew Young and James Clugnet full the GB cross-country ski staff in Beijing. The race begins at 07:00.
Sisters Leonie and Makayla Gerken Schofield get a second and final likelihood to attain the ladies’s moguls ultimate with qualification (10:00) earlier than the ultimate from 11:30.
The males’s singles luge concludes with runs three (11:30) and 4 (13:15). GB’s Rupert Staudinger was Twenty fourth after the primary two runs on Saturday and wants to transfer up to the highest 20 after the third run to make it to the ultimate one.
In blended doubles curling, Sunday pits GB towards China (01:05) and Norway (12:05) as Bruce Mouat and Jen Dodds proceed their bid to attain the semi-finals.
World watch
The girls’s brief programme in determine skating’s staff occasion will give us a primary Olympic have a look at Russian 15-year-old Kamila Valieva. Valieva has been successful events by report margins – watch specifically for her quad jumps. (Women’s brief programme from 01:37, males’s free skate from 03:57. The staff occasion concludes on Monday).
Every 4 years, Sven Kramer turns up and cranks out a males’s 5,000m pace skating title for the Netherlands. This 12 months will apparently be his final hurrah – he has mentioned he’ll retire later in 2022. If he wins once more, he’ll be part of an unique group of individuals (at the moment six) who’ve gained 4 Olympic gold medals in the identical particular person occasion. The occasion begins at 08:30. In a bid to point out a pace skater who is not Dutch on this guide, it is value noting Sweden’s Nils van der Poel was the world champion over 5,000m final 12 months and may cease Kramer coasting again to gold.
Expert data
There are query marks over the flexibility of China’s males to compete in ice hockey at Beijing 2022. As the host nation, China routinely earns a spot, however concern has been expressed that the boys will not meet the usual and may have to get replaced by Norway, who have been informed to stand by for a shock berth on the Games. In the ladies’s occasion, although, there isn’t a such concern. China’s girls reached the bronze-medal sport within the inaugural girls’s Olympic ice hockey event in 1998, and Japan – who’ve by no means completed larger than sixth at an Olympics – shall be an excellent take a look at at 08:40.
How to watch
Full particulars here.
BBC stay TV protection
All occasions listed are GMT (Beijing is eight hours forward). Event begin occasions are topic to change and the BBC just isn’t chargeable for any that could be made. Also, protection may be topic to late schedule modifications, so particulars might differ from this web page.
00:40-06:00 – BBC One
06:00-12:15 – BBC Two
12:15-15:05 – BBC One
15:05-17:00 – BBC Two
Plus a further stream of motion accessible right here:
01:00-16:00 – BBC iPlayer, BBC Sport web site and cell app
BBC Highlights
16:00-01:00 – BBC iPlayer, BBC Red Button, BBC Sport web site and cell app
19:00-20:00 – Today on the Games – BBC Two
21:30-22:30 – Winter Olympics Extra – BBC Three
BBC Radio 5 Live
BBC Radio 5 Live shall be readily available to carry you all of the key moments, tales and response via the Breakfast, Nicky Campbell and Adrian Chiles exhibits.
Other TV protection:
Eurosport can also be a rights holder for Beijing 2022 within the UK. You want a subscription to watch, and have a selection of stay motion on TV channels together with Eurosport 1 or Eurosport 2, or in-depth stay protection by occasion on the Eurosport app. Live protection begins at 01:00 GMT every day till round 16:00, adopted by highlights of the motion. For the total schedule go to the Eurosport website.
Monday, 7 February – day three
Medal events: 8
Alpine snowboarding (girls’s big slalom), biathlon (girls’s particular person), determine skating (staff), snowboard (males’s slopestyle), ski leaping (blended staff), brief monitor pace skating (girls’s 500m, males’s 1000m), pace skating (girls’s 1500m)
Highlights
Figure skating’s staff occasion concludes with the pairs free skate (01:22), ice dance free dance (02:36) and girls’s free skate (03:42). Canadian and Russian skaters have shared the 2 Olympic titles because the staff occasion started in 2014 however the Russians look to have a big edge this time round. The United States, bronze medallists in 2014 and 2018, will sense a chance to improve that.
Mikaela Shiffrin tops the billing within the first girls’s alpine occasion. The American leads the general World Cup standings, is ranked no decrease than fifth in any occasion, and is a real medal risk in 5 totally different events – a staggering achievement if she someway manages it. Shiffrin gained big slalom gold in 2018 and will defend the title from 02:15 together with her ultimate run anticipated nearer to 07:30. Alex Tilley goes for GB.
Brit watch
Freeskiing’s massive air events are added to the Olympics for the primary time. From 01:30 (girls) and 05:30 (males), skiers will head down an enormous ramp earlier than performing methods in the course of the few seconds of air time they generate on the finish. (If massive air sounds acquainted, the snowboarding model made its debut in Pyeongchang 4 years in the past). British curiosity lies with Izzy Atkin – a slopestyle bronze medallist in 2018 – alongside James Woods, Kirsty Muir and Katie Summerhayes.
Britain’s ultimate blended doubles curling round-robin sport comes towards the United States at 01:05. If they’ve achieved sufficient, Jen Dodds and Bruce Mouat will then be in semi-final motion at 12:05.
Short monitor’s males’s 1000m and girls’s 500m happen on Monday. The 500m is the game’s shortest and most frantic distance, a five-lap scramble that includes nearly not one of the pacing required for longer-distance skates. Kathryn Thomson, Twenty fourth in 2018, will characterize GB from 11:30 if she comes via Saturday’s heats. Expect Arianna Fontana, the Italian who collided with Elise Christie in 2014 and then gained Olympic gold in 2018, to star. Farrell and Niall Treacy might function within the males’s 1000m from 11:44. Finals begin at round 12:40.
If chosen, Ellia Smeding will race for GB in pace skating’s girls’s 1500m (08:30). Ireen Wust, a Dutch dwelling legend of the game, will look to win gold at a fifth consecutive Olympics.
World watch
Red Gerard was 17 when he overslept after a late evening binge-watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine, missed his alarm, misplaced his jacket and nonetheless gained Olympic slopestyle gold later that day. Four years later he is again and youthful athletes are in pursuit, like fellow US staff member Dusty Henricksen, who turns 19 two days earlier than the opening ceremony. Watch out for Canada’s Mark McMorris and Norway’s Marcus Kleveland from 04:00.
Somebody named Oberg will most likely stand on high of a biathlon podium in Beijing. Sisters Hanna and Elvira, from Sweden, have even completed on the rostrum collectively at latest World Cup events. Hanna, 26, gained particular person gold in 2018. Elvira, 22, is forward of Hanna on this season’s rankings. Austria’s Lisa Theresa Hauser, terribly correct in a sport that mixes capturing and snowboarding, can also be a contender. The race begins at 09:00.
Expert data
Ski leaping’s new blended staff occasion (11:45, ultimate jumps 12:51) has been welcomed by athletes who say that bringing males and girls collectively has modified the dynamic of what may be fairly a lonely sport. The high eight groups of two males and two girls from spherical one go in a second, ultimate spherical to decide the medals. Germany, Austria and Norway are possible to be robust contenders.
The occasion takes place on the traditional hill. That doesn’t suggest there’s something bizarre about different hills, it is simply referred to as regular hill to distinguish it from the big hill, which is about 1.25 occasions the dimensions and utilized by the boys later within the Games.
Tuesday, 8 February – day 4
Medal events: 10
Alpine snowboarding (males’s super-G), biathlon (males’s particular person), cross-country snowboarding (girls’s and males’s dash), curling (blended doubles), freestyle snowboarding (girls’s massive air), luge (girls’s singles), snowboard (girls’s and males’s parallel big slalom), pace skating (males’s 1500m)
Highlights
The first Olympic girls’s freeski massive air ultimate begins at 02:00. Watch for Tess Ledeux, from France. On her means to X Games gold in Aspen in January, she landed a double cork 1620 by no means beforehand carried out in competitors by a lady. Beijing is an opportunity for redemption for Ledeux, who was thought of such a scorching favorite for slopestyle gold in 2018 that she mentioned “even I assumed it was nearly sure,” solely to end fifteenth. Canada’s Megan Oldham and GB’s Izzy Atkin will hope to problem for medals.
Curling’s blended doubles concludes with the bronze-medal sport (06:05) and ultimate (12:05). GB’s Jen Dodds and Bruce Mouat are the world champions however the draw saved them away from a equally formidable Swedish staff at that occasion. Watch for Sweden this time round, whereas Canada’s Rachel Homan – paired with John Morris – is attempting to make up for a disastrous 2018 wherein she led the primary Canadian girls’s curling staff ever to miss the play-offs on the Olympics. Norway and Switzerland may also consider they will win gold.
The cross-country sprints are the game’s quickest events, notably this 12 months as they’re within the freestyle (ordinarily sooner) self-discipline, which alternates with traditional self-discipline from one Olympics to the following. The males’s occasion will function Norway’s Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo defending his Pyeongchang title towards Russian Alexander Bolshunov and Italy’s Federico Pellegrino. The girls’s occasion may carry a primary Olympic title for Maja Dahlqvist, now Sweden’s high prospect after compatriot Stina Nilsson switched to biathlon following her Pyeongchang 2018 win on this occasion. Races run from 08:00 to 12:15.
Brit watch
Cornelius Kersten will change into the primary Briton to compete in lengthy monitor pace skating for 30 years within the males’s 1500m (10:30). Kersten’s father is Dutch – he and companion Ellia Smeding, additionally a pace skater, stay within the Netherlands and opened their very own espresso firm to fund their ambition of competing in Beijing.
Also competing in massive air are Kirsty Muir and Katie Summerhayes, whereas GB’s cross-country contenders within the sprints are Andrew Musgrave, Andrew Young and James Clugnet.
World watch
Men’s super-G (03:00) takes alpine snowboarding’s downhill occasion and throws in some turns nevertheless it’s nonetheless all about pace. Switzerland’s Marco Odermatt gained the final World Cup super-G earlier than the Olympics and might be the favorite, though he is thought of much more dominant within the big slalom arising on 13 February. Norway’s Aleksander Aamodt Kilde shall be a contender too.
Natalie Geisenberger arrives in Beijing on a reluctant quest for a 3rd successive girls’s luge title (fourth and ultimate runs from 13:35). Geisenberger additionally took bronze in Vancouver so she hasn’t missed the rostrum in additional than a decade, however the German solely determined on the final minute to compete in China having earlier expressed concern about human rights violations and her perception that the hosts haven’t handled luge athletes effectively previously. “It takes greater than just some athletes to boycott,” she mentioned. “I’d have destroyed my very own dream.” Her rivals in Beijing will embody one other German, Julia Taubitz, and Austria’s Madeleine Egle.
In girls’s ice hockey, the US and Canada meet in a preliminary-round sport at 04:10. All the proof suggests this shall be a rehearsal of the ultimate, however you by no means know (Finland, if anybody, may squeeze considered one of them out).
Keep a watch on determine skating’s males’s brief programme (01:22) for clues as to the place the medals are going when the occasion concludes on Thursday. Nathan Chen, who was already a celebrity for the US aged 18 at Pyeongchang 2018, struggled in his brief programme, ruining his likelihood of a medal that 12 months. He went on to win three world titles in a row afterwards.
Expert data
Racers in snowboard’s parallel big slalom can attain speeds of greater than 40mph. Once the knockout stage begins (from 06:30), rivals race alongside one another on equivalent programs and the primary to the end goes via. Ester Ledecka gained gold on this occasion for the Czech Republic in 2018, one half of a singular double – she additionally gained super-G gold in alpine snowboarding, the primary time anybody has accomplished a ski and snowboard double on the similar Olympics. Ledecka is again to defend each of these titles this 12 months.
Wednesday, 9 February – day 5
Medal events: 6
Alpine snowboarding (girls’s slalom), freestyle snowboarding (males’s massive air), luge (doubles), nordic mixed (particular person regular hill), snowboard (girls’s snowboard cross), brief monitor pace skating (males’s 1500m)
Highlights
Women’s snowboard cross brings considered one of Britain’s largest medal prospects in Beijing. Charlotte Bankes is the reigning world champion in a assured crowd-pleaser of an occasion, wherein athletes go toe-to-toe down a course of bumps and jumps, usually with spectacular penalties. Bankes’ win in 2021 wasn’t a one-off, both – she gained silver in 2019 and is that this season’s World Cup factors chief. France’s Chloe Trespeuch shall be a detailed rival in Beijing, as will Lindsey Jacobellis, nonetheless an everyday podium occupant for the US after making her Olympic debut in 2006 (the place she took silver after an notorious late fall whereas main). Head-to-head racing begins at 06:30 and the ultimate will happen shortly after 07:45.
At the beginning of January, Mikaela Shiffrin failed to end a World Cup slalom for the primary time in 4 years. If that (plus her fourth-place end on this occasion 4 years in the past) makes you suppose her rivals have a shot in Beijing, keep in mind Shiffrin recovered from that DNF to win one other World Cup slalom two days later, breaking the report for essentially the most World Cup wins in a single occasion. Frida Hansdotter, who gained in 2018, has since retired. Slovakia’s Petra Vlhova is considered one of few athletes able to stopping Shiffrin. Racing begins at 02:15 with the climax anticipated at round 07:15. Charlie Guest and Alex Tilley ski for GB.
James Woods has been progressively closing in on an Olympic medal for GB. At Sochi 2014 he was fifth in freestyle snowboarding’s slopestyle occasion. In Pyeongchang 4 years later, he upgraded that to fourth. How about Beijing? Woods is primarily related to slopestyle however he has three X Games massive air medals to his identify. In 2019 Norway’s Birk Ruud, 21, grew to become the second athlete to win back-to-back X Games massive air gold and is a reputation to watch on the game’s Olympic debut (from 03:00).
Brit watch
Short monitor pace skating includes GB’s Kathryn Thomson within the girls’s 1000m heats (11:44) and Farrell Treacy is anticipated to line up within the males’s 1500m (from 11:00, ultimate 13:20). Ten of hosts China’s 13 winter medals in Olympic historical past have come briefly monitor and whereas 2018 champion Wu Dajing has battle for type these days, rising star Ren Ziwei has a shot at gold within the 1500m.
World watch
The males’s ice hockey event begins, once more with out lots of the world’s main gamers because the NHL has withdrawn its athletes for the second Olympics in a row. Last time that was to the good thing about Russia’s gamers, who gained gold in Pyeongchang. The Russian Olympic Committee staff open this 12 months’s event towards Switzerland (08:40).
Every 4 years, there are some Olympic certainties. The organisers can have to use synthetic snow to make a venue work (this 12 months? Check). There shall be a whole lot of curling (examine). And no person shall be in a position to absolutely comprehend luge doubles. Luge has been a conventional winter sport in Austria and Germany for hundreds of years, and the two-man occasion has been a aggressive self-discipline for greater than 100 years. But one man mendacity down on one other (there isn’t a girls’s occasion) and the 2 hurling themselves down an ice chute stays a singular spectacle. It’s on from 12:20. Germany has a staff of individuals fully named Tobias – Tobias Wendl and Tobias Arlt – who gained gold in 2014 and 2018, however compatriots Toni Eggert and Sascha Benecken could also be this 12 months’s favourites. Latvian brothers Andris Sics and Juris Sics have an opportunity.
Mixed doubles curling offers means to the start of the boys’s event. Britain aren’t in motion on the opening day so neutrals might choose to examine in on Norway v Switzerland (12:05), not least to see which trousers the Norwegians have introduced this 12 months.
Expert data
Nordic mixed begins with the person Gundersen regular hill/10km occasion from 07:00. If that final sentence is mindless, it is an occasion that mixes two nordic sports activities: ski leaping, then cross-country snowboarding. ‘Gundersen’ refers to the Gundersen methodology, developed by Norway’s Gunder Gundersen, which interprets ski leaping efficiency right into a head begin within the cross-country snowboarding. It’s principally snowboarding’s reply to cricket’s Duckworth-Lewis-Stern. Athletes soar on the traditional hill, somewhat than the big hill, then the cross-country ski lasts for 10km. Simple.
Thursday, 10 February – day six
Medal events: 8
Alpine snowboarding (males’s mixed), cross-country snowboarding (girls’s traditional), freestyle snowboarding (blended staff aerials), determine skating (males’s), luge (staff relay), snowboard (girls’s halfpipe, males’s snowboard cross), pace skating (girls’s 5,000m)
Highlights
The high male determine skaters battle for gold within the free skate from 01:37. This is extensively seen as an opportunity for US skater Nathan Chen to stamp his authority on the game after three successive world titles, whereas Japan’s Yuzuru Hanyu is searching for a 3rd Olympic title in a row. Jin Boyang, twice a world bronze medallist, completed fourth at Pyeongchang 2018 – one of the best efficiency by a Chinese skater within the Olympic males’s occasion.
British curlers are in motion 3 times on Thursday. Britain’s girls start their marketing campaign towards Switzerland at 01:05 then Sweden at 12:05, an enormous first day towards the groups that positioned first and fourth respectively eventually 12 months’s world championship. The males are drawn towards Italy at 06:05.
Chloe Kim, the youngest lady to win a snowboarding gold medal on the Olympics, is the heavy favorite to do it once more. Kim defends her halfpipe title from 01:30 with the ultimate runs beginning simply earlier than 02:30. If anybody stops her it could possibly be US team-mate Maddie Mastro, whereas China’s Cai Xuetong – generally known as ‘Tongtong’ – will hope to win a medal for the hosts.
Brit watch
Huw Nightingale competes within the males’s snowboard cross from 03:15, with the ultimate coming shortly after 07:15. France’s Pierre Vaultier retired after successful the previous two Olympic titles, leaving Austria’s Alessandro Hammerle and Germany’s Martin Norl the main contenders. At 40, Nick Baumgartner – fourth in Pyeongchang – turns into the oldest US snowboarder to attend an Olympics.
Skeleton was a medal manufacturing facility for Team GB at Pyeongchang 2018. Laura Deas and Dominic Parsons every gained bronze medals and, after all, Lizzy Yarnold gained gold for the second Games in a row. British curiosity this time round begins with Matt Weston and Marcus Wyatt within the males’s first and second runs (from 01:30), with the occasion concluding on Friday.
World watch
Unusually, blended staff aerials offers nations flexibility of their staff choice: you may have two males and a lady or two girls and a person competing within the three-athlete occasion. Each skier completes an aerials course (a collection of flips and twists) and the three scores are added collectively. China excel at aerials and the Russianteam are additionally medal contenders. The ultimate begins at 11:00.
The US ice hockey males face China at 13:10. While the withdrawal of NHL gamers from the Winter Olympics has weakened the American facet, there have lengthy been fears that China’s males merely aren’t aggressive at Olympic stage – regardless of stories of China constructing lots of of ice rinks and coaching hundreds of gamers in a bid to change that after being awarded the Games. Many of the China gamers at Beijing 2022 are anticipated to be North America-born athletes who’ve switched nationality to the host nation. Canada play Germany on the similar time, a repeat of an encounter that led to an enormous upset when the Germans defeated Canada 4-3 in 2018’s semi-finals.
Expert data
Martina Sablikova gained 10 consecutive world titles in pace skating’s 5,000m (12:00) regardless of there being no pace skating rink in her residence nation, the Czech Republic. Despite that formidable report, she was pushed into second place in 2018 and faces a stern take a look at this 12 months from the Netherlands’ Irene Schouten and Canada’s Isabelle Weidemann.
Friday, 11 February – day seven
Medal events: 7
Alpine snowboarding (girls’s super-G), biathlon (girls’s dash), cross-country snowboarding (males’s traditional), snowboard (males’s halfpipe), skeleton (males’s), brief monitor pace skating (girls’s 1,000m), pace skating (males’s 10,000m)
Highlights
He’s again. Shaun White, winner of Olympic snowboard gold in 2006, 2010 and 2018, returns to the halfpipe for the United States. Not that an unprecedented fourth title in his occasion shall be a stroll – he is had ankle bother and Covid-19 within the build-up to the Games, and Australia’s Scotty James and Japan’s Ayumu Hirano (who competed in skateboarding on the Tokyo Olympic Games) shall be out to cease him. Watch from 01:30.
Men’s skeleton reaches its climax with the ultimate two runs from 12:20 and the climax simply earlier than 14:00. Skeleton has delivered not less than one medal for Team GB at each Olympics wherein it has featured, however just one this century – Dominic Parsons in 2018 – was gained by a person. Matt Weston gained World Cup gold in a outstanding three-way tie for first place in November, whereas Marcus Wyatt took silver within the Olympic take a look at occasion on the Beijing monitor. Evergreen Latvian brothers Martins and Tomass Dukurs are nonetheless going – and nonetheless trying to find a primary Olympic title – and any of the German staff shall be medal threats, too.
Brit watch
Friday’s cross-country 15km males’s traditional(07:00) falls between Andrew Musgrave’s deal with longer-distance events and the desire of James Clugnet and Andrew Young for sprints. At the enterprise finish of the race, you are possible to discover Finland’s Iivo Niskanen, Russian Alexander Bolshunov, and doubtlessly Norway’s Johannes Hosflot Klaebo, all of whom are suited to each the gap and the traditional format.
Women’s skeleton begins with runs one and two at 01:30 and 03:00. Laura Deas returns for Team GB following her bronze medal-winning efficiency in Pyeongchang, joined this time by Olympic debutant Brogan Crowley. Lizzy Yarnold, the Olympic champion in 2014 and 2018, retired from the game after Pyeongchang and may be discovered on BBC TV this time round.
Friday’s curling pits GB’s males towards the US (01:05) and Norway (12:05), whereas the ladies face South Korea (06:05).
World watch
Ester Ledecka shall be again within the girls’s super-G (03:00), the opposite half of her well-known Pyeongchang 2018 double wherein she gained gold in each alpine snowboarding and snowboarding’s parallel big slalom. Ledecka stays a top-10 athlete in super-G. Rivals may embody Federica Brignone, who in 2020 grew to become the primary Italian lady to win the general World Cup title.
Speed skating holds its longest particular person occasion, the boys’s 10,000m (08:00). In 2018, this was the primary pace skating occasion not to be gained by a Dutch skater – type of. Canada’s Ted-Jan Bloemen, who switched from the Netherlands to characterize Canada earlier than Pyeongchang, gained gold 4 years in the past. Bloemen returns, as does Jorrit Bergsma, who completed second for the Dutch final time round.
Biathlon’s girls’s 7.5km dash (09:00) could possibly be a battle between Norway’s Tiril Eckhoff, the world champion, and Marte Olsbu Roiseland, who gained silver in Pyeongchang. The 2018 champion, Germany’s Laura Dahlmeier, has retired.
Expert data
China has been drumming up the hype for brief monitor pace skating by airing a 29-episode TV drama collection titled Beyond, which tells the tales of a number of generations of the nation’s high skaters. Fan Kexin, who gained silver at Sochi 2014, may go one step past for the hosts within the girls’s 1000m (ultimate at 12:43). Meanwhile, preparations in South Korea – usually a short-track powerhouse – have been distracted by a authorized battle over disparaging textual content messages despatched by star Shim Suk-hee about team-mates. Shim will miss Beijing 2022 after being banned by her nationwide federation in response.
Saturday, 12 February – day eight
Medal events: 6
Biathlon (males’s dash), cross-country snowboarding (girls’s relay), snowboard (blended staff snowboard cross), ski leaping (males’s massive hill), skeleton (girls’s), pace skating (males’s 500m)
Highlights
This might be the primary day Team GB’s chef de mission appears to be like for when every Winter Olympic schedule is launched: the ladies’s skeleton finale. At each Olympics since its introduction in 2002, girls’s skeleton has delivered a medal for Britain – bronze in 2002, silver in 2006 and gold at each Games since. No strain, then, on Laura Deas to match or improve her 2018 bronze. Recent outcomes would recommend that shall be robust, however then you might have mentioned the identical prior to Pyeongchang. The Netherlands’ Kimberley Bos begins because the favorite. Run three is from 12:20 and the fourth, ultimate run begins at 13:55.
Snowboard cross was already one of many liveliest events on the Olympic calendar. Now there is a new format to take pleasure in: the blended staff occasion sends the boys off first, then palms no matter time benefit the male athlete earns over to the girl. The first feminine athlete throughout the road wins for the staff. As common, it is a head-to-head knockout format and guarantees to be gripping. Starts at 02:00, ultimate simply earlier than 03:00. GB’s entrants are Charlotte Bankes and Huw Nightingale.
Brit watch
Figure skating’s ice dance begins with the rhythm dance (beforehand generally known as the brief dance) from 11:07 until 14:38. Lilah ‘No’ Fear and Lewis Gibson are the British entrants. Lilah has her own podcast the place you may hear her interview Lewis in addition to the likes of Jayne Torvill, who after all was one half of the final British ice dance duo to win an Olympic medal. Other interviewees embody Canadian determine skating legend Tessa Virtue and US star Nathan Chen. Fear and Gibson positioned seventh for GB on the final World Championship.
Just one slice of GB curling motion on Saturday: the ladies play the US at 12:05.
World watch
The relays are often the place the Norway-Sweden rivalry in cross-country snowboarding reaches a climax. As an instance, at Pyeongchang 2018, the 2 nations’ girls’s relay groups have been simply two seconds aside after 20 kilometres – and greater than 40 seconds forward of anybody else. Expect related this 12 months. Starts 07:30.
Canada play the US in males’s ice hockey at 04:10. The lack of NHL gamers means every nation had to be inventive at brief discover in who they chose, and that’ll create an fascinating match-up. For instance, Canada’s squad consists of youth within the type of Owen Power, 2021’s primary draft decide who has but to play an NHL sport, and Eric Staal, who performed within the NHL for 17 years – and gained Olympic gold at Vancouver 2010 – earlier than leaving the league final 12 months.
Expert data
Ski leaping progresses to the boys’s massive hill occasion (11:00). In this sport, distance is all in regards to the Ok-point, the gap roughly two-thirds of the way in which down the hill that’s thought of the equal of a par rating. Jump past the Ok-point and you acquire factors, come up brief and you lose them. (You’re additionally judged on model by a panel of judges positioned round midway down the soar). A hill’s measurement is measured by its Ok-point. An common regular hill could be referred to as a K90, and a big hill could be a K120, for instance, 120 being the gap in metres from the highest of the hill to the Ok-point.
Sunday, 13 February – day 9
Medal events: 7
Alpine snowboarding (males’s big slalom), biathlon (girls’s and males’s pursuit), cross-country snowboarding (males’s relay), brief monitor pace skating (girls’s relay, males’s 500m), pace skating (girls’s 500m)
Highlights
In brief monitor pace skating, the boys’s 500m is the game’s quickest occasion (from 11:00). The hosts have big potential in Ren Ziwei and Wu Dajing however they could possibly be outwitted by a pair of Chinese-Hungarian brothers. Liu Shaolin and Liu Shaoang race for Hungary and are ranked first and fourth on the earth respectively on this occasion. Their Chinese heritage makes Beijing one thing of a homecoming, though a wierd one because the pandemic will restrict who can really attend. “Beijing is a large alternative for us,” Shaolin mentioned earlier than the Olympics. “Since there can solely be native spectators, I hope they’ll help us in the identical means as home rivals.”
Settling in for a serene Sunday of curling? Britain’s males face hosts China at 01:05 for evening owls, then return at 12:05 towards Denmark. GB’s girls additionally play Denmark at 06:05.
Brit watch
On what’s in any other case a quiet day for British motion, the freeski slopestyle trio of Izzy Atkin, Kirsty Muir and Katie Summerhayes are in qualifying from 02:00 until 04:00.
World watch
Most of the brand new events at Beijing 2022 are blended gender, however one exception is the ladies’s monobob – the primary look of a one-person bobsleigh on the Olympics. (There isn’t any equal males’s occasion, however the males have a four-person occasion and the ladies don’t, so there are nonetheless almost 80 extra bobsleigh locations for males in Beijing than there are for ladies). The self-discipline’s main names could also be acquainted: topping the rankings heading into the Games are US duo Elana Meyers Taylor and Kaillie Humphries, each winners of a number of Olympic medals (Humphries gained two Olympic two-woman titles for Canada earlier than switching to the US staff).
Following the ladies on Saturday, cross-country’s males maintain their relay on Sunday (07:00). It’s twice the gap of the ladies’s occasion and is Norway’s occasion to lose. This was the scene of a signature Johannes Hosflot Klaebo second in 2018 as he powered away to flip a detailed race into a cushty Norwegian victory on the final leg of the Pyeongchang relay.
Speed skating’s rankings state there isn’t a faster lady on the earth over 500m than the United States’ Erin Jackson. But she nearly missed the Olympics. A slip throughout trials in January left her in third place and and not using a place on Team USA regardless of her monitor report – till team-mate Brittany Bowe gave Jackson her 500m place. “This is an act I’ll always remember,” mentioned Jackson, who’s the primary black American lady to win a pace skating World Cup. The girls’s 500m begins at 13:56.
Expert data
It’s pursuit day on the biathlon, which brings with it a singular begin. Competitors start the race primarily based on their efficiency within the sprints held on the earlier days. Say you gained the dash by 10 seconds out of your nearest rival. You would begin the pursuit 10 seconds sooner than them, and the remainder of the pursuit is them, effectively, pursuing you primarily based on that preliminary benefit. So whoever performs effectively within the sprints at Beijing 2022 begins the pursuit with a greater likelihood of securing one other medal. The girls’s occasion begins at 09:00 and the boys’s race at 10:45.
Monday, 14 February – day 10
Medal events: 5
Bobsleigh (monobob), freestyle snowboarding (girls’s slopestyle, girls’s aerials), determine skating (ice dance), ski leaping (males’s staff)
Highlights
Not many medals to be gained on Monday. It’s nearly as if the athletes produce other issues to take into consideration on 14 February. Head to the determine skating for a matchless marriage of romance and resilience because the ice dance reaches its conclusion (01:22-04:36). This might be the game’s most open occasion in Beijing – winners may come from France (Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron), Canada (Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier), Russia (Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov) or past. GB duo Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson have improved from Twenty fourth to seventh on the World Championships since 2018.
Women’s ski slopestyle concludes from 01:30. Izzy Atkin was on the rostrum for GB as a bronze medallist in 2018 however any of Atkin, Katie Summerhayes or Kirsty Muir may problem for medals in Beijing 4 years later. Atkin is having to come again from a damaged pelvis sustained eight weeks earlier than the Games. Estonia’s Kelly Sildaru, who first gained an X Games gold medal on the age of 13, is a number one contender.
Brit watch
Brad Hall and Nick Gleeson began the 12 months with World Cup silver within the two-man bobsleigh, a end result that Hall mentioned demonstrates “we’re severe Olympic medal contenders”. Monday is the day to begin proving that within the first two of 4 runs (from 12:05 and 13:40).
Curling pits Britain’s girls towards Canada at 12:05. Eve Muirhead’s rink gained bronze at Sochi 2014, the Games at which Canadian skip Jennifer Jones took gold, and a win right here could be a press release for the Britons. Muirhead’s staff is fully modified from eight years in the past and even from her final look, in Pyeongchang. Jones’ staff retains Kaitlyn Lawes and Dawn McEwen from 2014 (Jones herself didn’t skip Canada’s staff in 2018).
Men’s ski slopestyle qualification begins at 04:30 and options James Woods starting his bid to enhance upon fourth place in 2018.
Snowboard massive air qualifying additionally takes place (girls from 01:30 and males from 05:30), marking one other medal alternative for Katie Ormerod, who has six profession World Cup massive air podiums to her identify.
World watch
Athletes ascending to the highest of the Beijing ski soar shall be met with a view of the Great Wall of China, native stories state, as they put together to fling themselves down the ramp. In ski leaping’s staff occasion in Pyeongchang, Norway took gold, breaking a cycle wherein the highest two podium locations have been shared by two of Germany, Austria or Finland for 4 straight Olympics. Ski leaping all the time appears to be like nice underneath lights so it is one of many later events to begin, at 11:00 (ultimate spherical from 12:06).
Women’s freeski aerials (11:00) must be a contented searching floor for the hosts. Xu Mengtao and Kong Fanyu have each reached the Olympic podium earlier than however have by no means gained gold. They’re the 2 main athletes within the sport this season.
Expert data
The monobob (concludes 03:00) introduces not solely a brand new, one-person bobsleigh but additionally a brand new strategy to the tools athletes use. Traditionally, sliding sports activities profit from the identical form of technological “marginal positive factors” as different sports activities like monitor biking, the place comparatively wealthy nations can make investments massive sums in growing sleds that outpace these of their rivals. Monobob modifications that. The guidelines state solely standardised one-person sleds can be utilized, and limitations are positioned on the extent to which these sleds may be modified. In idea, that ought to serve to spotlight the expertise of the athlete and minimise the affect of behind-the-scenes analysis and growth.
Tuesday, 15 February – day 11
Medal events: 9
Alpine snowboarding (girls’s downhill), bobsleigh (two-man), biathlon (males’s relay), freestyle snowboarding (males’s slopestyle), Nordic mixed (massive hill), snowboard (girls’s and males’s massive air), pace skating (girls’s and males’s staff pursuit)
Highlights
The girls’s downhill is among the many day’s early events at 03:00. Team USA’s aptly named Breezy Johnson is taken into account a high contender within the pace events though her build-up hasn’t been with out issues – she crashed twice in two weeks on the World Cup circuit in January. Mikaela Shiffrin, her team-mate, is all the time a risk. The aftermath of one other crash might open up this race: Italy’s Sofia Goggia, the 2018 champion, fractured a leg bone, partly tore a ligament and sprained her knee in a race simply three weeks earlier than the Games. She’s attempting to make it again in time for the downhill however it could take a unprecedented restoration for Goggia to be aggressive.
Nobody British has stepped on an Olympic two-man bobsleigh podium since Tony Nash and Robin Dixon gained gold in 1964. Brad Hall and Nick Gleeson are ranked fifth on the earth heading into Beijing 2022 and, if Monday’s first two runs have been aggressive, could possibly be able to reset the clock from 12:15. Canadian pilot Justin Kripps and German equal Francesco Friedrich are again after dramatically sharing gold 4 years in the past.
On paper, there are many athletes standing between James Woods and a ski slopestyle medal (01:30-02:50). In apply, Woods delivers at massive events: high 4 at Pyeongchang 2018 and final 12 months’s World Championships, successful the world title in 2019. Favourites for gold will embody Switzerland’s Fabian Bosch, this season’s world-leading athlete, who can solely enhance on a 2018 Olympics at which his unorthodox approach to escalators outshone his Twenty fourth-place end.
Brit watch
Katie Ormerod will hope to function within the girls’s snowboard massive air ultimate from 01:30. In the boys’s occasion (05:00), Canada’s Sebastien Toutant is hoping to defend his Olympic title. He warmed up by snowboarding via the streets of Montreal in January.
Natasha McKay skates within the brief programme as the ladies’s determine skating begins (from 10:08). The 27-year-old completed Seventeenth within the European Championships a month earlier than the Games.
Round-robin curling continues. Britain’s males face Sweden at 12:05 after the ladies play Japan from 06:05.
Lloyd Wallace, whose mum and dad each appeared on the Olympics as freestyle skiers within the late Nineteen Eighties and early ’90s, options in males’s aerials qualifying from 11:00.
World watch
Biathlon legend Martin Fourcade left the game in a blaze of glory, successful three Olympic titles at Pyeongchang 2018. The 13-time world champion’s departure means a brand new era of French biathletes are studying to win with out him. Watch out for France as underdogs within the males’s relay (09:00), an occasion ordinarily dominated by Scandinavia, Germany and Austria.
Expert data
Speed skating’s staff pursuit will look acquainted to anybody who enjoys monitor biking at a Summer Olympics. Two groups race head to head, beginning on reverse sides of the monitor. The race ends when the quickest staff crosses the road or catches the opposite staff (a rarity in pace skating). This is one occasion the Dutch have failed to dominate, successful solely two of eight males’s and girls’s titles since staff pursuit was launched to the Games in 2006. The girls’s ultimate is at 08:28 and the boys’s ultimate at 08:47.
Wednesday, 16 February – day 12
Medal events: 7
Alpine snowboarding (males’s slalom), biathlon (girls’s relay), cross-country snowboarding (girls’s and males’s staff dash), freestyle snowboarding (males’s aerials), brief monitor pace skating (girls’s 1,500m, males’s relay)
Highlights
Dave Ryding’s astonishing World Cup slalom win in Kitzbuhel, lower than a month earlier than the Olympics, despatched a wave of vitality via Team GB on the eve of Beijing 2022. Wednesday is males’s slalom day, when Ryding will strive to summon the identical type that turned him into Britain’s first alpine snowboarding World Cup winner. He’ll be joined by GB’s Billy Major for the primary runs at 02:15 and second runs from 05:45.
Speaking of GB firsts, no person British has ever reached an Olympic cross-country snowboarding podium. Changing that in Wednesday’s staff dash shall be a tough process however an entertaining one to watch (from 09:00, finals begin at 11:00). Two team-mates alternate brief, ultra-fast laps concurrently their rivals, usually creating pandemonium on the end and memorable finales like American Jessie Diggins plucking gold away from Sweden by a fifth of a second after almost 16 minutes in 2018.
Brit watch
Five of the highest male freeski aerials athletes on the earth proper now are Chinese, so the hosts’ expectations shall be as sky-high because the jumps from 11:00 on Wednesday. Maxim Burov, a three-time world champion from Russia, may spoil the occasion. GB’s Lloyd Wallace has proven he can submit top-10 finishes on the world stage.
Kathryn Thomson skates within the girls’s 1500m brief monitor pace skating from 11:30. Dutch skater Suzanne Schulting has obliterated the sphere over each distance previously season and shall be a favorite right here. Unusually, Thomson tied with GB Olympian Elise Christie in August’s British trials – a photograph end could not separate them.
World watch
Ice hockey’s girls’s bronze-medal play-off takes place at 11:30. The fashionable knowledge would dictate that Canada will face the United States within the ultimate, nevertheless it’s potential Finland – narrowly overwhelmed finalists at 2019’s World Championship – may bump a kind of two into the battle for third place. Still, half of the bronze medals awarded since girls’s ice hockey entered the Olympics in 1998 have gone to Finland, so the percentages are that is the place they will find yourself, and the percentages are they will win.
Expert data
Sweden’s Niklas Edin has gained 5 of the previous eight males’s world curling titles, relationship again to 2013 – the one skip in historical past to rack up that many world gold medals within the males’s sport. Yet someway, that has by no means translated into an Olympic title. Edin gained bronze in Sochi and silver in Pyeongchang. By the time we attain the penultimate day of the 2022 round-robin event, whether or not Edin is on monitor to go one higher in Beijing shall be a lot clearer. Meanwhile, GB’s girls play China from 01:05 and the boys face Russia’s athletes from 06:05.
Thursday, 17 February – day 13
Medal events: 6
Alpine snowboarding (girls’s mixed), freestyle snowboarding (girls’s ski cross), determine skating (girls’s), ice hockey (girls’s), Nordic mixed (staff), pace skating (girls’s 1,000m)
Highlights
The Olympic girls’s determine skating is among the most seen moments of any Games. Whose career-defining moments will come on Thursday? All the thrill is about 15-year-old Kamila Valieva and although she’s the favorite, she is not even the one Russian with a chance to win. Alexandra Trusova, 17, may pounce if Valieva slips up, as may Anna Shcherbakova – the reigning world champion. GB’s entrant is Natasha McKay. The girls’s free skate begins at 10:08.
Snowboard cross has been and passed by this level within the Games. Step ahead ski cross, which is each bit as thrilling, simply with added limb-flail. Thursday is girls’s ski cross day with head-to-head racing from 06:00, culminating simply after 07:10. Canada recorded a one-two in Pyeongchang and whereas Olympic champion Kelsey Serwa has retired, Canada simply has the expertise to report the identical end result once more. Sweden’s Sandra Naeslund is a number one contender too, as is Switzerland’s Fanny Smith.
Brit watch
There could possibly be quite a bit on the road as each GB curling groups head into their ultimate round-robin video games. Britain’s males, specifically, can have to get previous a significant curling energy in Canada (01:05) in the event that they want a end result from their final group sport. GB’s girls play the Russians from 06:05.
World watch
OK, so we have established that the ladies’s hockey gold-medal sport at Pyeongchang 2018 ordinarily includes the identical two groups – Canada and the US. That would not cease the ultimate being an thrilling watch. Whenever these two have met in an Olympic ultimate, the successful margin has all the time been two objectives or fewer. In the previous two Games, we wanted time beyond regulation (and, in 2018, a shootout) to separate them. So both strap your self in at 04:10 for an additional nice match-up between the North American rivals, or take pleasure in a shock ultimate if one or each of them do not make it.
Speed skating’s girls’s 1000m (08:30) will mark yet one more alternative for the Netherlands’ Ireen Wust to add to a tally that stood at 5 gold medals initially of Beijing 2022. The 35-year-old, a champion at each Winter Olympics since 2006, has by no means gained the 1000m occasion on the Games. The closest she got here was silver at Sochi 2014.
Expert data
Qualification begins within the freeski halfpipe (from 01:30 for the ladies and 04:30 for the boys). GB are represented by Zoe Atkin and Gus Kenworthy. Kenworthy’s CV is, to put it mildly, various. He gained slopestyle silver as a US athlete in 2014, staying behind to assist undertake stray puppies after the Sochi Games. He got here out in 2015, turning into considered one of winter sport’s most distinguished brazenly homosexual athletes. In 2019, he switched his aggressive allegiance to Britain. He has additionally appeared as a visitor decide on RuPaul’s Drag Race and starred as Chet Clancy in TV present American Horror Story: 1984. Asked about his determination to compete for GB as a substitute of the US, he mentioned: “I suppose I’ve all the time appeared good in pink, white and blue.”
Friday, 18 February – day 14
Medal events: 4
Biathlon (males’s mass begin), freestyle snowboarding (girls’s halfpipe, males’s ski cross), pace skating (males’s 1,000m)
Highlights
Zoe Atkin, youthful sister of Izzy, is Britain’s hope in girls’s ski halfpipe (01:30-02:49). The 19-year-old has two World Cup podium finishes to her identify, together with a gold medal when she was simply 16. She took bronze in final 12 months’s World Championship too. US freeskier Eileen Gu, Estonia’s Kelly Sildaru and Russian Valeriya Demidova are among the many different contenders.
Curling medals begin to be handed out, starting with the boys’s bronze-medal play-off at 06:05. At Pyeongchang 2018, Britain’s males misplaced a tie-breaker that will in any other case have seen them advance to the bronze play-off, and finally completed fifth.
Brit watch
Ollie Davies grew to become the primary Briton to attain the ski cross massive ultimate at a World Championship final 12 months, ending fourth. Friday marks his Olympic debut with the knockout runs starting at 06:45 and the finals beginning simply earlier than 08:00.
Cornelius Kersten returns in pace skating’s 1000m occasion. He’s ranked eleventh on the earth over this distance within the 2021-22 season. The subject consists of Dutch skaters like Thomas Krol and Kjeld Nuis towards Norway’s Havard Holmefjord Lorentzen and Canada’s Laurent Dubreuil.
Mica McNeill and Montell Douglas go within the first two runs of the two-woman bobsleigh (12:00 and 13:30).
World watch
Biathlon’s mass begin does what it says on the tin: everybody begins on the similar time. At Pyeongchang 2018 the highest two biathletes even managed to end on the similar time: Martin Fourcade and Simon Schempp every crossed the road in a time of 35 minutes 47.3 seconds, requiring shut scrutiny of the end digital camera earlier than Fourcade was handed the gold medal.
The males’s ice hockey semi-finals happen at 04:10 and 13:10.
Expert data
Figure skating has two Olympic events that function a person and a lady competing collectively: ice dance and pairs. To perceive the distinction, watch the pairs occasion’s opening day (10:38-13:43). Pairs includes extra acrobatic strikes like jumps and overhead lifts, whereas ice dance locations extra emphasis on choreographic components like twizzles and step sequences. Pairs can also be simply recognisable for components like throw jumps – jumps the place the person throws the girl into the air and she should then land with out help – and dying spirals, the place the girl spins across the man whereas just about parallel with the ice.
Saturday, 19 February – day 15
Medal events: 9
Alpine snowboarding (blended staff parallel), bobsleigh (two-woman), biathlon (girls’s mass begin), cross-country snowboarding (males’s mass begin), curling (males’s), freestyle snowboarding (males’s halfpipe), determine skating (pairs), pace skating (girls’s and males’s mass begin)
Highlights
The males’s halfpipe (01:30-02:49) would be the final occasion of Gus Kenworthy‘s profession, he says. The Sochi 2014 silver medallist, then representing the US however now competing for GB, has reached Beijing 2022 regardless of having barely competed for the previous 12 months following a variety of setbacks like head accidents and Covid-19. Even so, when he competes, he is invariably a medal contender. New Zealand’s Nico Porteous, Canada’s Brendan Mackay and American Alex Ferreira are the shape athletes heading into this occasion.
The final time Britain gained a males’s curling gold medal was in 1924. By now we’ll know if there’s an opportunity of a repeat efficiency nearly a century later. The battle for males’s curling gold begins at 06:05 and whereas Canada and Sweden are the probably contenders on paper on the Games’ outset, Bruce Mouat led Scotland to final 12 months’s world ultimate so has demonstrated he can attain this stage. The girls’s bronze-medal play-off follows at 12:05.
Brit watch
Two-woman bobsleigh concludes with run three (12:00) and run 4 (13:30). The choice of Montell Douglas, competing for GB alongside Mica McNeill, makes her the primary British lady to compete at each a summer time and winter Games – she ran within the 100m at Beijing 2008, which means each of her Olympic appearances can have are available in the identical metropolis. McNeill is wanting to enhance on eighth at Pyeongchang 2018, which was one of the best efficiency by a British girls’s bobsleigh staff at an Olympics.
Four-man bobsleigh additionally begins on Saturday. Brad Hall’s staff shall be in motion from 01:30 (run one) and 03:05 (run two).
World watch
Figure skating’s pairs occasion concludes from 11:05. Russian athletes may dominate, with two duos – Anastasia Mishina and Aleksandr Galliamov, and Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov – equally able to successful gold. The Chinese staff of Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, world and Olympic silver medallists, will strive to go one higher on residence ice.
Ice hockey’s males’s bronze-medal play-off takes place at 13:10.
Cross-country snowboarding’s longest slog – a 50-kilometre race anticipated to take two hours or extra – begins at 06:00. Finland’s Iivo Niskanen and Russian Alexander Bolshunov, the highest two in 2018, stay two of the largest medal threats. Of the British contingent, Andrew Musgrave is probably to have a shot over this distance.
Speed skating’s mass begin, described as ‘Nascar on ice’ after its introduction on the Pyeongchang Olympics, begins at 07:00. Up to 24 skaters line up initially, then it is a mad sprint – or as a lot of a splash as skating greater than six kilometres may be – to end the 16 laps first.
Expert data
Alpine snowboarding wraps up with the blended staff parallel occasion from 03:00 (ultimate 04:46). In every spherical, nations choose two males and two girls. In 4 races, athletes from two groups ski head-to-head down equivalent programs on the similar time. Whoever wins every race scores a degree. At the tip, whichever nation has essentially the most factors advances to the following spherical. If it is a 2-2 tie, the staff with the combination quickest time goes via.
Sunday, 20 February – day 16
Medal events: 4
Bobsleigh (four-man), cross-country snowboarding (girls’s mass begin), curling (girls’s), ice hockey (males’s)
Highlights
On the Olympics’ ultimate day, the 2 staff events which were the spine of the schedule lastly conclude.
Curling’s girls’s gold-medal sport takes place early within the day at 01:05. Unlike the boys, who cannot purchase an Olympic gold, Sweden’s girls have gained three of the previous 4 Olympic titles. Britain’s girls have not reached the ultimate since 2002, when Rhona Martin’s staff gained gold.
Ice hockey’s finale, the boys’s gold-medal sport, begins at 04:10. The absence of NHL gamers makes this the second successive wide-open Olympics, though the power of Russia’s KHL means the ROC are hotly tipped to efficiently defend their gold from 2018.
Brit watch
Brad Hall’s British four-man bobsleigh staff competes in runs three (01:30) and 4 (03:20) to spherical off the occasion. Hall, Greg Cackett, Nick Gleeson and Taylor Lawrence have been racking up World Cup podium finishes this season so there’s hope for a big enchancment on Hall’s Seventeenth-place end at Pyeongchang 2018.
World watch
Cross-country snowboarding concludes with the ladies’s 30km mass begin. This was the scene of Norwegian Marit Bjorgen’s beautiful swansong at Pyeongchang 2018, when she gained gold and her report fifteenth medal at a Winter Olympics. Bjorgen’s retirement means Norway will look to Therese Johaug however Sweden’s Frida Karlsson might even see a gap.
Expert data
Beijing 2022’s closing ceremony (12:00-14:10) will see organisers formally hand the torch to Milan-Cortina 2026. The Italian metropolis of Milan and Alpine neighborhood of Cortina d’Ampezzo would be the subsequent hosts of the Winter Olympics, the fourth time Italy has staged the Olympic Games and the second to go to Cortina d’Ampezzo, which additionally hosted in 1956. There are shades of London 2012’s emblem in the stylised 26 that represents the following Winter Games.
