The 2018 Winter Olympics (Korean: 2018년 동계 올림픽, romanized: Icheon sip-pal nyeon Donggye Ollimpik), officially the XXIII Olympic Winter Games (French: Les XXIIIes Jeux olympiques d'hiver;[note 2]Korean: 제23회 동계 올림픽, romanized: Jeisipsamhoe Donggye Ollimpik) and also known as PyeongChang 2018 (Korean: 평창2018, romanized: Pyeongchang Icheon sip-pal), were an international winter multi-sport event held between 9 and 25 February 2018 in Pyeongchang, South Korea, with the opening rounds for certain events held on 8 February, a day before the opening ceremony.
Pyeongchang was elected as the host city for the 2018 Winter Games at the 123rd IOC Session in Durban, South Africa in July 2011. This marked the second time that South Korea had hosted the Olympic Games (having previously hosted the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul), as well as the first time it hosted the Winter Olympics. The 2018 Games marked the third time that an Asian country had hosted the Winter Olympics, after Sapporo1972 and Nagano1998, both in Japan. It was also the first Winter Olympics held in mainland Asia, and the first of three consecutive Olympic Games held in East Asia, preceding the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics in Japan and the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in China.
South Korea ranked seventh overall at the 2018 Winter Games, with five gold medals and 17 overall medals. South Korea has traditionally been a country that won many medals in short track speed skating, but in this competition, it also won medals in skeleton racing, curling and skiing. South Korea's Yun Sung-Bin won a gold medal in men's skeleton racing, the first Olympic gold ever won by Asia in the sledding event. Norway led the total medal tally with 39, followed by Germany at 31 and Canada at 29.[1] Germany and Norway were tied for the highest number of gold medals, both winning 14.
Pyeongchang was elected as the host city at the 123rd IOC Session in Durban, South Africa, on 6 July 2011, earning the necessary majority of at least 48 votes in just one round of voting.[2] Winning 63 of the 95 votes cast in the first secret ballot, Pyeongchang received more votes than its competitors combined, overwhelmingly beating Munich in Germany, which received 25 votes, and Annecy in France, which received seven.[3][4]
This was South Korea's third consecutive bid for the Winter Olympics, having been defeated by Vancouver and Sochi respectively in the final rounds of voting for the 2010 and 2014 Games.[3] Earlier, PyeongChang lost to Vancouver with a difference of 3 votes in bidding the 2010 Olympics, and lost to Sochi with a difference of 4 votes in bidding the 2014 Olympics. Since then, South Korea made great progress in preparing to host the Winter Olympics and succeeded in hosting the 2018 Olympics after three challenges.[4]
After winning the election, Pyeongchang became the third Asian city to host the Winter Olympics.[2][3] Also, South Korea became the second country in Asia to host both the Summer (1988 Seoul Olympics) and Winter Olympics.
On 5 August 2011, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced the formation of the Pyeongchang 2018 Coordination Commission.[6][7] On 4 October 2011, it was announced that the Organizing Committee for the 2018 Winter Olympics would be headed by Kim Jin-sun. The Pyeongchang Organizing Committee for the 2018 Olympic & Paralympic Winter Games (POCOG) was launched at its inaugural assembly on 19 October 2011. The first tasks of the organizing committee were putting together a master plan for the Games as well as forming a design for the venues.[8] The IOC Coordination Commission for the 2018 Winter Olympics made their first visit to Pyeongchang in March 2012. By then, construction was already underway on the Olympic Village.[9][10] In June 2012, construction began on a high-speed rail line that would connect Pyeongchang to Seoul.[11]
The International Paralympic Committee met for an orientation with the Pyeongchang 2018 organizing committee in July 2012.[12] Then-IOC President Jacques Rogge visited Pyeongchang for the first time in February 2013.[13]
The Pyeongchang Organizing Committee for the 2018 Olympic & Paralympic Winter Games created Pyeongchang WINNERS in 2014 by recruiting university students living in South Korea to spread awareness of the Olympic Games through social networking services and news articles.[14]
2018 Olympics gold medal
Medals
The design for the Games' medals was unveiled on 21 September 2017. Created by Lee Suk-woo, the design features a pattern of diagonal ridges on both sides, with the Olympic rings on the front, and the obverse showing the 2018 Olympics' emblem, the event name and the discipline. The edge of each medal is marked with extrusions of hangul alphabets, while the ribbons are made from a traditional South Korean textile.[15] Gold medals contained 99 percent of silver and 1 percent of gold, which is a traditional composition for Olympic gold medals. At 586 grams (20.7 oz) they were the heaviest medals in the Olympic history.[16][17]
The torch relay started on 24 October 2017 in Greece and lasted for 101 days, ending at the start of the Olympics on 9 February 2018. The Olympic torch entered South Korea on 1 November 2017. There were 7,500 torch bearers to represent the combined Korean population of approximately 75 million people. There were also 2,018 support runners to guard the torch and act as messengers.
Most of the outdoor snow events were held in the county of Pyeongchang, while some of the alpine skiing events took place in the neighboring county of Jeongseon. The indoor ice events were held in the nearby city of Gangneung.
The Gangneung Olympic Park, in the neighborhood of Gyo-dong in Gangneung city, includes four indoor sports venues, all in close proximity to one another.
Ticket prices for the 2018 Winter Olympics were announced in April 2016 and tickets went on sale in October 2016. Event tickets ranged in price from ₩20,000 South Korean won (approx. US$17) to ₩900,000 (~US$787) while tickets for the opening and closing ceremonies ranged from ₩220,000 (~US$192) to ₩1.5 million (~US$1311). The exact prices were determined through market research; around 50% of the tickets were expected to cost about ₩80,000 (~US$70) or less, and tickets in sports that are relatively unknown in the region, such as biathlon and luge, were made cheaper in order to encourage attendance. By contrast, figure skating and the men's ice hockey gold-medal game carried the most expensive tickets of the Games.[22]
As of 11 October 2017, domestic ticket sales for the Games were reported to be slow. Of the 750,000 seats allocated to South Koreans, only 20.7% had been sold. International sales were more favorable, with 59.7% of the 320,000 allocated tickets sold.[23][24] However, as of 31 January 2018, 77% of all tickets had been sold.[25]
Parade of Nations at 2018 Olympic opening ceremony
The opening ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics was held at the Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium on 9 February 2018. The US$100 million facility was only intended to be used for the opening and closing ceremonies of these Olympics and the subsequent Paralympics; it was demolished following their conclusion.[26][27][28]
Sports
The 2018 Winter Olympics featured 102 events over 15 disciplines in 7 sports,[29] making it the first Winter Olympics to surpass 100 medal events. Six new events in existing sports were introduced to the Winter Olympic program in Pyeongchang: men's and ladies' big air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling, men's and ladies' mass start speed skating, and mixed team alpine skiing.[29][30]
Numbers in parentheses indicate the number of medal events contested in each separate discipline.
Participating National Olympic Committees
A record total of 93[note 1] teams qualified at least one athlete to compete in the Games. The number of athletes who qualified per country is listed in the table below (number of athletes shown in parentheses). Six nations made their Winter Olympics debuts: Ecuador, Eritrea, Kosovo, Malaysia, Nigeria and Singapore.[31] Athletes from three further countries – the Cayman Islands, Dominica, and Peru – qualified to compete, but all three National Olympic Committees returned the quota spots back to the International Ski Federation (FIS).[32]
Under a historic agreement facilitated by the IOC, qualified athletes from North Korea were allowed to cross the Korean Demilitarized Zone into South Korea to compete in the Games.[33][34][35] The two nations marched together under the Korean Unification Flag during the opening ceremony.[36][37] A unified Korean team, consisting of 12 players from North Korea and 23 from South Korea, competed in the women's ice hockey tournament under a special IOC country code designation (COR) following talks in Panmunjom on 17 January 2018.[36] The two nations also participated separately: the South Korea team competed in every sport, while the North Korea team competed in alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, figure skating, and short track speed skating.[38]
The IOC has allowed NBC to influence the Olympic event scheduling to maximize U.S. television ratings when possible, due to the substantial fees paid by NBC for rights to the Olympics (which have been extended through 2032 with a nearly $8 billion agreement), the company being one of IOC's major sources of revenue.[46][47] As figure skating is one of the most popular Winter Olympic sports among U.S. viewers, the figure skating events were scheduled with morning start times to accommodate primetime broadcasts in the Americas. This scheduling practice affected the events themselves, including skaters having to adjust to the modified schedule, as well as attendance levels at the sessions.[48]
Conversely, and somewhat controversially, eight of the eleven biathlon events were scheduled at night, making it necessary for competitors to ski and shoot under floodlights, with colder temperatures and blustery winds.[49]
Noriaki Kasai of Japan became the first athlete in history to participate in eight Winter Olympics when he took part in the ski jumping qualification the day before the opening of the Games.[54] The previous record of seven Winter Olympics was held by Russian luger Albert Demchenko.
Dutch speed skater Ireen Wüst won an individual gold medal for the fourth Olympics in a row, the first time this had been achieved by a Winter Olympian. She also became the first speed skater (male or female) to win ten Winter Olympic medals and the first female Winter Olympian to win nine individual medals.[62]
Chinese short track speed skater Wu Dajing beat the men's 500 m world record twice en route to winning a gold medal, becoming only the second person in history to skate the discipline in under 40 seconds (after American J. R. Celski), and the first to achieve this at "sea level".[63]
Germany and Canada tied for gold in the two-man bobsleigh event, only the second time in history that two countries had tied for a gold medal in this particular event, the first time being in the 1998 Winter Olympics twenty years earlier.[67]
Norway won a total of 39 medals, setting a new record for the highest number of medals won at a single Winter Olympics. Their 39th medal was the last gold medal won by cross-country skier Marit Bjørgen in the 30 km classical event. The record was previously held by the USA who won 37 medals in Vancouver 2010.[68]
Broadcast rights to the 2018 Winter Olympics were already sold in some countries as part of long-term broadcast rights deals, including the Games' local rightsholder SBS, which in July 2011 had extended its rights to the Olympics through 2024.[69] SBS sub-licensed its rights to MBC and KBS.[70]
On 29 June 2015, the IOC announced that Discovery Communications (now Discovery, Inc.) had acquired exclusive rights to the Olympics across all of Europe (excluding Russia) from 2018 through 2024. Discovery's pan-European Eurosport channels were promoted as the main broadcaster of the Games, but Discovery's free-to-air channels such as DMAX in Spain,[71]Kanal 5 in Sweden, and TVNorge in Norway, were also involved in the overall broadcasting arrangements.[72] Discovery was required to sub-license at least 100 hours of coverage to free-to-air broadcasters in each market;[73][74] some of these agreements required certain sports to be exclusive to Eurosport and its affiliated networks.[75] The deal did not initially cover France due to the broadcast rights of France Télévisions, which run through to the 2020 Games.[76] In the United Kingdom, Discovery held exclusive pay television rights under licence from the BBC, in return for the BBC sub-licensing the free-to-air rights to the 2022 and 2024 Olympics from Discovery.[77]
Russian state broadcaster Channel One, and sports channel Match TV, committed to covering the Games with a focus on Russian athletes.[76] Russia was not affected by the Eurosport deal, due to a pre-existing contract held by a marketing agency which extends to 2024.[76]
In the United States, the Games were once again broadcast by NBCUniversal properties under a long-term contract and for the first time ever that the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics will be held on NBC on the same year.[78][79] On 28 March 2017, NBC announced that it would adopt a new format for its primetime coverage of the 2018 Winter Olympics, with a focus on live coverage in all time zones to take advantage of Pyeongchang's 14-hour difference with U.S. Eastern Time (and 17-hour difference with U.S. Pacific Time), and to address criticism of its previous tape delay practices. As before, the primetime block began at 8:00 p.m. ET (5:00 p.m. PT), and unlike previous Olympics, was available for streaming. Figure skating events were deliberately scheduled with morning sessions so they could be aired during primetime in the Americas (and in turn, NBC's coverage; due to the substantial fees NBC has paid for rights to the Olympics, the IOC has allowed NBC to have influence on event scheduling to maximize U.S. television ratings when possible; NBC agreed to a $7.75 billion contract extension on 7 May 2014, to air the Olympics through the 2032 games,[46] is also one of the major sources of revenue for the IOC).[47][48] Coverage took a break in the East for late local news, after which coverage continued into "Primetime Plus", featuring additional live coverage into the Eastern late night and Western primetime hours.
The 2018 Winter Olympics were used to showcase 5G wireless technologies, as part of a collaboration between domestic wireless sponsor KT, and worldwide sponsor Intel. Several venues were outfitted with 5G networks to facilitate features such as live camera feeds from bobsleds, and multi-camera views from cross-country and figure skating events. These were offered as part of public demonstrations coordinated by the two sponsors.[87][88]
The winners of the Olympic Golden Rings Awards were announced in June 2019. There were 75 pieces of broadcast content from the 2018 Olympics submitted over ten categories (plus one category for the 2018 Youth Olympics). NBC won a total of eight awards, winning four of the main categories: Best Olympic Feature, Best Olympic Digital Service, Best Olympic program and Best Documentary Film; they came second in the Best On-Air Promotion and Best Social Media Content/Production categories. Discovery/Eurosport won four categories: Best On-Air Promotion, Best Production Design, Best Innovation and Best Social Media Content/Production; they also came second in the Best Olympic Digital Service category. The BBC and NHK took the other two main awards: Most Sustainable Operation and Best Athlete Profile respectively. The title of Best Feature at the Youth Olympic Games Buenos Aires 2018 was also awarded to the BBC.[89]
The official emblem, reflecting ice crystals and derived from the hangul letters ㅍ and ㅊ—the initial sounds of "Pyeong" and "Chang"—was unveiled on 3 May 2013.[90] In all official materials, the name of the host city was stylized in CamelCase as "PyeongChang", in order to alleviate potential confusion with Pyongyang, the similarly named capital of neighboring North Korea.[91]
New international sponsorship deals also debuted in Pyeongchang: Toyota was introduced as the new "Mobility" sponsor of the Olympics, although the company waived its domestic sponsorship to the local competitors Hyundai and Kia due to their support of the Pyeongchang bid.[92][93][94][95][96]Alibaba Group and Intel also debuted as e-commerce/cloud services and technology sponsors respectively.[97][98]
Due to the state of relations between North and South Korea, concerns were raised over the security of the 2018 Winter Olympics, especially in the wake of tensions over North Korean missile and nuclear tests. On 20 September 2017, South Korean president Moon Jae-in stated that the country would ensure the security of the Games.[99] The next day, Laura Flessel-Colovic, the French Minister of Youth Affairs and Sports, stated that France would pull out of the Games if the safety of its delegation could not be guaranteed.[100]
Protesters at Gwanghwamun Plaza, criticizing the event's pro-North Korean measures
The next day, Austria and Germany raised similar concerns and also threatened to skip the Games. France later reaffirmed its participation.[101] In early December 2017, the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, told Fox News that it was an "open question" whether the United States was going to participate in the Games, citing security concerns in the region.[102] However, days later the White House Press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, stated that the United States would participate.[103]
In his New Year's address on 1 January 2018, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un proposed talks in Seoul over the country's participation in the Games, which would be the first high-level talks between the North and South in over two years. Because of the talks, held on 9 January, North Korea agreed to field athletes in Pyeongchang.[104][105] On 17 January 2018, it was announced that North and South Korea had agreed to field a unifiedKorean women's ice hockey team at the Games, and to enter together under a Korean Unification Flag during the opening ceremony.[36][106]
These moves were met with opposition in South Korea, including protests and online petitions; critics argued that the government was attempting to use the Olympics to spread pro-North Korean sentiment, and that the unified ice hockey team would fail.[107] A rap video entitled "The Regret for Pyeongchang" (평창유감), which echoed this criticism and called the event the "Pyongyang Olympics", went viral in the country.[108] Japan's foreign affairs ministerTarō Kōno warned South Korea to be wary of North Korea's "charm offensive", and not to ease its pressure on the country.[36][109]
The South Korean President, Moon Jae-in, at the start of the Olympics shook hands with Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and a prominent figure of the regime. This marked the first time since the Korean War that a member of the ruling Kim dynasty had visited South Korea.[110][111] In contrast, U.S. vice president Mike Pence met with Fred Warmbier (father of Otto Warmbier, who had died after being released from captivity in North Korea) and a group of North Korean defectors in Pyeongchang.[112] American officials said that North Korea cancelled a meeting with Pence at the last minute.[113]
At the closing ceremony, North Korea sent general Kim Yong-chol as its delegate. His presence was met with hostility from South Korean conservatives, as there were allegations that he had a role in the ROKS Cheonan sinking and other past attacks. The Ministry of Unification stated that "there is a limitation in pinpointing who was responsible for the incident." Although he is subject to sanctions, they did not affect his ability to visit the country for the Games.[114][115]
Russia's participation in the 2018 Winter Olympics was affected by the aftermath of its state-sponsored doping program. As a result, the IOC suspended the Russian Olympic Committee in December 2017, although Russian athletes whitelisted by the IOC were allowed to compete neutrally under the OAR (Olympic Athletes from Russia) designation.[116] The official sanctions imposed by the IOC included: the exclusion of Russian government officials from the Games; the use of the Olympic flag and Olympic Anthem in place of the Russian flag and anthem; and the submission of a replacement logo for the OAR uniforms.[117]
By early January 2018, the IOC had banned 43 Russian athletes from competing in the 2018 Winter Olympics and all future Olympic Games (as part of the Oswald Commission). Of those athletes, 42 appealed against their bans to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and 28 of the appeals were successful, but eleven of the athletes had their sanctions upheld due to the weight of evidence against them. The IOC found it important to note that CAS Secretary General "insisted that the CAS decision does not mean that these 28 athletes are innocent" and that they would consider an appeal against the court's decision. Hearings for the remaining three athletes were postponed.[118]
The eventual number of neutral Russian athletes that participated at the 2018 Games was 168. These were selected from an original pool of 500 athletes that was put forward for consideration and, in order to receive an invitation to the Games, they were obliged to meet a number of pre-games conditions. Two athletes, who met the conditions and were cleared by the IOC, subsequently failed drug tests during the Games.
Russian presidentVladimir Putin and other officials had signalled in the past that it would be a humiliation if Russian athletes were not allowed to compete under the Russian flag.[119] However, there were never actually any official plans to boycott the 2018 Games[116] and in late 2017 the Russian government agreed to allow their athletes to compete at the Games as individuals under a neutral designation.[120][121] Despite this public show of co-operation, there were numerous misgivings voiced by leading Russian politicians, including a statement from Putin himself saying that he believed the United States had used its influence within the IOC to "orchestrate the doping scandal".[122] 86% of the Russian population opposed participation at the Olympics under a neutral flag,[123] and many Russian fans attended the Games wearing the Russian colors and chanting "Russia!" in unison, in an act of defiance against the ban.[124]
The IOC's decision was heavily criticized by Jack Robertson, primary investigator of the Russian doping program on behalf of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), in whose opinion the judgement was commercially and politically motivated. He argued that not only was doping rife among Russian athletes but that there was no sign of it being eradicated.[125] The CAS decision to overturn the life bans of 28 Russian athletes and restore their medals was also fiercely criticized, by Olympic officials, IOC presidentThomas Bach and whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov's lawyer.[126]
^Kang Ah-young (20 September 2017). "언론사, 평창 동계올림픽 카운트다운" [Media, PyeongChang Winter Olympics Countdown]. journalist.or.kr (in Korean). Archived from the original on 11 January 2018. Retrieved 17 February 2018.
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