The Tokyo Olympics ended just six months ago. Yet here we are again, with another Olympic Games set to begin. Each Olympics is unique in its own way, but these Games will have a special distinction. Beijing hosted the Summer of Phelps & Bolt 14 years ago and now becomes the first city to serve as the official host of both a Summer and Winter Games.
What's cool is that they're reusing some of the venues from 2008. The Water Cube, the site of Mr. Phelps' triumphs, is now the "Ice Cube," where the curling competition is taking place. Hockey and figure skating are being held in the arenas that were used for gymnastics, basketball and volleyball. And, of course, the magnificent Bird's Nest Stadium will hold its second Opening Ceremony.
Beijing is only hosting the ice events and big air snowboarding/skiing (on a really cool-looking jump that looks like a dragon), though. Everything else is in the mountains outside of the city, some of which are more than 100 miles away. As a result, there are three separate Olympic Villages, one for each venue cluster.
It's also the first time that the Winter Olympics and Super Bowl overlap, which is something the NFL has made sure will be a regular occurrence every fourth year moving forward (have I mentioned how much I hate that stupid 17th game?!). NBC was wise to make sure they had the Super Bowl this year, making for an incredible Super Bowl Sunday. I'm curious to see if the Olympics are overshadowed at all, though. I'm sure they will be. It's really more a question of how much and for how long?
There are things about this Olympics that can't be avoided, either. They're controversially taking place in China, which led the U.S. and several other Western nations to stage a "diplomatic boycott" over China's human rights record. China's also the country where the COVID-19 pandemic started, and the world is still in the midst of it as we enter the second COVID Olympics.
Just like in Tokyo, there will be restrictions. The athletes are once again living and competing in a bubble environment. Foreign spectators are once again prohibited, and no tickets were sold. Although, unlike last year, there will be fans in the stands, as Olympic organizers will invite "select groups" to attend each event.
Also unlike last year, these Olympians weren't left hanging wondering whether the Games would be postponed or not. There was so much uncertainty for the world's summer athletes leading up to Tokyo. That's not the case this time. After those Games were able be put on successfully, it was pretty clear that there would be no delay for Beijing 2.0. Even with the omicron variant, postponement simply wasn't going to happen.
And, I don't know about you, but I could use a second helping of Olympics in six months (even if I haven't finished clearing the Tokyo Games off my DVR yet). I'm not old enough to remember that time, but it's a throwback to when the Summer and Winter Olympics were held in the same year, which last happened 30 years ago in Albertville and Barcelona.
So what should we look out for at Beijing 2.0? Well, I'm looking forward to the debut of women's monobob, which is exactly what it sounds like. One-person bobsled. There's already two-man and four-man bobsled. Now monobob joins the ranks, giving the women a second event. They've also added more events in snowboarding and freestyle skiing, as well as a mixed team relay in short track (which sounds really fun!).
We were also supposed to see the NHL's return to the Olympics after an eight-year absence. That, of course, was made impossible by the number of games that the league had to postpone because of COVID. As a result, we'll have to wait until 2026 for that, and the ROC (with its team full of KHL players) will be the overwhelming favorites to win a second straight gold medal.
They keep adding more and more events to the Winter Olympics, so the all-time record for most medals at a single Games keeps getting easier to achieve. The current record is Norway's 39 in PyeongChang. I think they beat that this time, becoming the first nation ever to win 40 medals at a Winter Olympics. They may set a record for gold medals, too.
As for the United States, "consistent" is the first word that comes to mind. After winning 10 gold medals in Salt Lake City, that number has been exactly nine at each of the last four Winter Olympics. I see the Americans being right in that range once again while fighting Germany, Canada and the ROC for second place in the medal standings behind Norway.
American medal chances are in all of the standard sports you'd think of, too. There should be plenty in snowboarding and freestyle skiing, while women's hockey and Nathan Chen in figure skating are also safe bets. You can probably count on at least one medal from Mikaela Shiffrin, too, and maybe Jessie Diggins can grab an individual gold after her history-making win in PyeongChang. I also like the chances to medal in women's speed skating for the first time in 20 years.
Overall, I've got 29 countries winning medals in Beijing, including 19 taking at least one gold. Here's my top 10:
- Norway 41 (16-14-11)
- Germany 28 (12-6-10)
- ROC 27 (9-7-11)
- United States 26 (10-9-7)
- Canada 25 (8-11-6)
- Austria 21 (6-8-7)
- France 20 (8-3-9)
- Japan 20 (3-10-7)
- China 17 (7-6-4)
- Sweden 16 (7-6-3)
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