Where did the 1998 Olympics take place? Olympics in Nagano

From February 7 to 22, 1998, the XVIII Winter Olympic Games were held in Nagano (Japan). The program included 14 sports and 68 disciplines. 72 countries participated (2338 athletes: 1528 men and 810 women).

Long before the beginning of the XVIII winter Olympic Games experts predicted that any country would need 11-12 gold medals to win a team victory in Nagano. And this prediction was completely justified. After the competitions in all 68 numbers of the program ended. The German delegation had 12 medals of the highest standard, Norway - 10, Russia - 9.

Phenomenal, unprecedented in Olympic history success was achieved by Russian skiers who won all five races on the most difficult tracks in Hakuba. Three gold - two for victories in individual races and one in the relay, as well as a silver and a bronze medal, was brought from Japan to the city of Odintsovo near Moscow by Larisa Lazutina. This athlete accomplished a real feat, for which, immediately upon her return to her homeland, she was awarded the title "Hero of the Russian Federation" by the Decree of the President of the country.

The representative of Japan returned from Japan as a two-time Olympic champion Vladimir region Olga Danilova. It was she who, ahead of her rivals at a 15-kilometer distance, won the first of those played in Nagano gold medal and gave additional confidence to her teammates, with whom she excelled in the relay race.

The real discovery of the Games was Yulia Chepalova. Victory in the race for 30 kilometers of this young Muscovite, who was born in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, and studied at the Khabarovsk State Institute physical education, was for many, of course, unexpected. But only for the coaches: they saw Yulia as the future leader of our women's ski team.

Elena Vyalbe and Nina Gavrylyuk deserve special words of gratitude. They failed to win the individual races. But they shone on their stages of the relay and deservedly received gold medals. From now on, both Elena and Nina are triple Olympic champions, since Gavrylyuk in 1988 and 1994, and Vyalba in 1992 and 1994, already shared with their friends the joy of victory in relay races.

Figure skaters contributed three gold medals to the common treasury. This is certainly an outstanding achievement. Oksana Kazakova and Artur Dmitriev became champions in pair skating, Pasha Grischuk and Evgeny Platov in ice dancing, in men's singles- Ilya Kulik. All of them showed the highest skill and fortitude. Only after the end of the competition did it become clear, for example, that Grischuk competed with a broken wrist! She and her wonderful partner were the first in history to win two Winter Olympics in a row.

Photo: AFP

Galina Kukleva, a biathlete from Tyumen, won another gold medal for Russia. The 7.5 km race, in which she won, turned out to be one of the most dramatic. Indeed, at the finish line, the champion and the silver medalist were separated by only 0.7 seconds. An elusive moment in which years of painstaking work are concentrated.

So 11 Russian athletes became the champions of the XVIII Winter Olympic Games.

Information provided Olympic Committee Russia.

Nagano (Japan)

The Winter Games have returned to Japan 26 years after the Sapporo Olympics. In the struggle for the right to host the sports forum, Nagano was ahead of American Salt Lake City, Swedish Östersund, Spanish Jaca and Italian Aosta. Competitions on the island of Honshu were accompanied by heavy snow with rain and fog, due to which some of the starts had to be postponed. In addition, on February 20, an earthquake with a magnitude of 5 occurred in Nagano Prefecture - the Olympians were very scared, although no one was hurt. At the same time, the Games themselves left a good impression. First of all, thanks to the hospitality of the Japanese and the wonderful audience. In addition, the organizers of the Olympics managed to rein in the general sponsors of the IOC, who were very intrusive during the previous summer Olympics in 1996.

		W	WITH	B	Total
1	Germany	12	9	8	29
2	Norway	10	10	5	25
3	Russia	9	6	3	18
4	Canada	6	5	4	15
5	USA	6	3	4	13

Venue: Nagano, Japan
February 7 - 22, 1998
Number of participating countries - 72
Number of athletes participating - 2176 (787 women, 1389 men)
Medal sets - 68
Team Winner - Germany

The three main characters of the Games according to "SE"

Dominik Hasek (Czech Republic),
hockey
Hermann Mayer (Austria),
skiing
Larisa Lazutina (Russia),
ski race

Bure outdid Gretzky

Number of participants Winter Games in Nagano for the first time exceeded the mark of 2000 athletes. This was due to the new expansion of the competition program. Into the winter family Olympic sports Sports have entered women's hockey, snowboarding and curling. But the main event was the agreement between the IOC and the NHL, which for the first time in history allowed players from the strongest hockey league peace. The last restrictions on the appearance of pros in the Games have been lifted, and the regular season of the NHL has been on hiatus. The hockey tournament in Nagano beat all possible TV ratings. Although the CBS television company, which paid $375 million for the right to broadcast the Olympics, was still unhappy with the unsuccessful performance of the Americans and Canadians.

The Russian men's national hockey team in Nagano was made up entirely of NHL players, with the exception of the third goalkeeper Oleg Shevtsov. Pavel Bure, Sergei Fedorov and Alexei Yashin were considered the main stars of the team. Vyacheslav Fetisov, Igor Larionov, Alexander Mogilny, Nikolai Khabibulin, Sergey Zubov and some other famous hockey players refused the invitation to the national team. In many ways, the refusal was caused by the failed performance of our "dream team" at the 1996 World Cup, as well as the death in the spring of 1997 of the president of the national ice hockey federation, Valentin Sych, who fell from a killer's bullet. Perhaps it was the stars-refuseniks that the Russian team lacked in order to defeat the Czechs in the final of the 1998 Olympics.

The decisive match of the hockey tournament between the national teams of the Czech Republic and Russia ended with a football score of 1:0 in favor of our rivals. Czechs, which included Dominik Hasek and Jaromir Jagr, become Olympic champions. And the Russian fans could console themselves only with the phenomenal result of Pavel Bure - in the semifinals, the captain of the Russian team sent five goals into the Finns' gates.

But the great Canadian scorer Wayne Gretzky, for whom Nagano was the first and last chance to compete at the Olympics, scored only four assists in the entire tournament. It got to the point that Canada's coach Mark Crawford did not trust the 37-year-old veteran to perform a post-match shootout in the semi-finals against the Czechs. In that series, Hasek won all five duels against the Maple Leaves, depriving the founders of hockey of the chance for gold. Frustrated Canadian stars could not get together in the match for third place with the Finns and were left in Nagano without medals at all.

TRIUMPH OF SKIERS

In addition to hockey, in February 1998 the whole country followed the Olympic figure skating tournament. In it, Russia won three out of four gold medals - Ilya Kulik, a couple Oksana Kazakova and Artur Dmitriev, as well as a dance duet Oksana Grischuk and Evgeny Platov tried their best. The latter took the second Olympic title in a row in Nagano, despite the fact that Oksana competed with a broken wrist. In addition, two months before the start of the Games, Grischuk unexpectedly announced that she should now be called by the name Pasha (according to one of the versions, so that she would not be confused with the Ukrainian single skater Oksana Baiul). After Nagano-1998, the duo broke up. Grischuk began performing with Alexander Zhulin and returned to her former name.

The performances of our skiers in Japan turned out to be very successful. Representatives of Russia - Larisa Lazutina, Olga Danilova and Yulia Chepalova collected all the individual gold, in addition, the Russian team won the relay. For the 21-year-old Chepalova, this was the first Olympics - it was in Nagano that her star rose. In men, the Norwegian Bjorn Daly became the hero of the ski track, who, following the results of the 1998 Games, became the most titled athlete in the history of the Winter Olympics - in his collection 8 gold and 4 silver medals. Another record was set in the figure skaters tournament - 15-year-old American Tara Lipinski became the youngest individual champion in the history of the White Games.

One of the most highlights The 1998 Olympics turned out to be an incident with the Austrian skier Hermann Maier. After a horrific downhill crash, the Austrian not only returned to the start, but also won gold medals in the super-G and giant slalom. Thanks to this feat, the nickname Herminator stuck to Mayer - by analogy with the invulnerable cinematic Terminator. In the luge competition, the public applauded the German Georg Hakl, who won the third Olympics in a row. The Hakl medal proved to be an important contribution to the German national team - the Germans won the overall standings, ahead of the Norwegians by two gold. Our team dropped to third place for the first time. Even the incredible victory of biathlete Galina Kukleva did not help, who in the 7.5 km race was only 7 tenths of a second ahead of the German Uschi Disl.

CHAMPION'S SPIRIT

The scandal marked the Olympic debut of snowboarding. The first-ever Olympic champion in giant slalom, Canadian Ross Rebagliatti, was immediately caught on marijuana. The athlete explained the presence of the drug in his doping test by visiting a party where Ross's friends allegedly smoked a sensimilla, and Rebagliatti accidentally inhaled intoxicating smoke. The junkie champion was disqualified, but, to everyone's surprise, was acquitted two days later. The IOC decided not to escalate the situation and believed the Canadian's excuses. In addition, it turned out that marijuana is not included in the list of prohibited drugs - this misunderstanding was corrected, but the athlete was not punished retroactively.

In general, IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch did not like to pedal the topic of doping and, according to some reports, even thought about legalizing stimulants. But the competitions in Nagano were the last winter Olympics of the Spanish marquis. Very different times will soon come in sports, and the future of many champions of the Japanese Games will not be as bright as it seemed in 1998. Larisa Lazutina and Olga Danilova will end their careers after doping revelations at the 2002 Olympics, in 2009 Yulia Chepalova will fall under the hood of anti-doping services. Another skier - the winner of the 30 km race Finn Mika Myllula - two years after Nagano will be at the center of a high-profile doping scandal, become addicted to alcohol and in 2011 will be found dead in his apartment. The police will come to the conclusion that Myllula committed suicide.

The German speed skater Claudia Pechstein, who won the 5000m race at the 1998 Games, will be disqualified at the end of her career on the basis of her "blood passport" data, spend several years on the courts and eventually prove that the abnormal indicators of her analysis are caused by a hereditary disease. By the way, Pechstein achieved success in Nagano not only due to her natural abilities, but also against the background of the technical revolution that occurred in the mid-1990s in this sport. On the eve of the 1998 Games, almost all leading speed skaters began using clapboard skates with a detachable heel. The novelty, combined with a special running technique, made it possible to increase the length of the skater's push and his speed. By the beginning of the Olympics, the Dutch and Germans were the best with valves. But Russian athletes were not ready for these changes.

Featured sports
Biathlon
Bobsled
Skiing
Curling
Skating
Nordic combined
Ski race
ski jumping
luge
snowboarding
Short track
Figure skating
Freestyle
Hockey

The Japanese city of Nagano is located 220 kilometers northeast of Tokyo. Nagano was elected the capital of the XVIII Winter Olympic Games at the 97th session of the IOC, held on June 13-16, 1991 in Birmingham.

2338 athletes took part in the Winter Olympics, including 810 women. The Olympic Games in Nagano became the most massive in terms of the number of participants and the number of participating countries - 72. Athletes competed in 14 sports in 68 disciplines. Curling was included in the Olympic Games. There were two sets of medals for men and women. Also, the program of the Nagano Olympics included snowboarding competitions - two types of competitions for men and women: giant slalom and half-pipe competitions. Of the 72 countries that competed for the top places, only 24 were successful, winning 205 medals.

In biathlon competitions, Norwegian athletes won 5 medals - 2 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze. Germany won 5 medals - 2 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze. Team Russia 3 medals, one of each value. In the 7.5 km race, with one miss, Galina Kukleva took the gold. The Russian team was second in the 4 × 7.5 km relay. Biathlete from Ukraine Elena Petrova won silver in the 15 km race. In the 20 km race, the bronze medal was won by Aleksey Aydarov, Belarus.

In bobsleigh, among the twos, the Italians from the first team became the strongest, the second athletes from the Canada-1 team, the third - Germany-1. In the bean-fours competition, athletes from the Germany-2 team were in the lead, Switzerland-1 was in second place, and Great Britain-1 was in third.

In alpine skiing, 10 sets of awards were played. Representatives of 9 countries became owners of 30 medals. 11 medals were taken home by Austrian athletes - 3 gold, 4 silver, 4 bronze. German athletes won 6 awards - 3 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze. Athletes from Norway 4 medals - 1 gold and 3 silver. Athletes from Italy have two medals - gold and silver, France - gold and bronze, Switzerland - 2 bronze. Athletes from the USA have one medal each - gold, Sweden - silver, Australia - bronze - the only award at the XVIII Winter Olympics in Nagano.

In men's curling, athletes from Switzerland excelled, athletes from Canada were in second place, and Norway was in third. In women, athletes from Canada became the leaders, athletes from Denmark were in second place, and Sweden were in third.

In Nordic combined in the 90m springboard discipline and the 15 km race, Bjerte Engen Wiek from Norway became the champion, Samppa Lajunen from Finland was the second, and Valery Stolyarov from Russia won the third place. In the discipline of 90 m springboard and 4x5 km relay, the Norwegian team was in the lead, athletes from Finland were in second place, and France was third.

IN cross-country skiing in men, Norwegian athletes performed better than others, winning 4 gold and 2 silver medals. Vladimir Smirnov of Kazakhstan finished third in the 15K freestyle pursuit and fourth in the 10K classic style. Russian Alexei Prokurorov was fourth in the 50 km freestyle race. In the 4 × 10 km relay, the Russian team showed the fifth result. In women, the Russians excelled. Larisa Lazutina won 5 Olympic medals - 3 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medals - one medal in each type of competition. Olga Danilova won 2 gold and 1 silver. Julia Chepalova - 2 gold. Elena Vyalbe - one gold. Irina Taranenko-Terelya of Ukraine finished fourth in the 10 km race.

Japanese athletes excelled in ski jumping, winning 2 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medals. Athletes from Finland won 1 gold and 1 silver medal, Germany - 1 silver, Austria - 2 bronze.

Luge was conquered by German athletes, winning 3 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medals. Athletes from the USA won a silver and a bronze medal, Italy - 1 silver, Austria - 1 bronze.

In speed skating it was found 5 World records and 5 Olympic records!

In snowboarding, four sets of awards (12 medals) were shared between representatives of 8 countries. Athletes from Germany won gold and silver medals, Switzerland - gold and bronze, Norway - 2 silver, USA - 2 bronze; one athlete each: Canada and France in gold, Italy - silver, Austria - bronze.

IN figure skating Ilya Kulik from Russia was the strongest in skating; Tara Lipinski from USA; Oksana Kazakova and Artur Dmitriev from Russia, in sports couples; Oksana (Pasha) Grischuk and Evgeny Platonov from Russia, in sports dancing.

In the men's freestyle mogul competition, Johnny Mosley from the USA was in the lead. The second and third places went to athletes from Finland. In women, Tae Satoya from Japan became the champion, the second place was taken by an athlete from Germany, the third - Norway. In ski acrobatics for men, Eric Bergust from the USA won the gold medal, second place went to an athlete from France, and third place to an athlete from Belarus Dmitry Dashinsky. In women, Nikki Stone from the USA took first place, second place went to an athlete from China, and third place went to Switzerland. Ukrainians Tatyana Kozachenko and Alla Tsuper showed fourth and fifth results respectively.

Masters from the Czech Republic took the lead in ice hockey for men, the national team of Russia was in second place, Finland was in third, and Belarus was in fifth. In women, American hockey players became the strongest. The second place was taken by athletes from Canada, the third - from Finland.

In the men's short track championship, Korean athletes won gold and silver medals, Japan and Canada won gold and bronze medals, China won 2 silver and bronze medals. In women, the strongest were athletes from Korea - 2 gold and 2 bronze medals, Canada - gold and bronze medals, China - 3 silver.

In the overall standings, German athletes won the most medals at the XVIII Winter Olympic Games in Nagano - 29 medals (12 gold, 9 silver, 8 bronze). The second were athletes from Norway with 25 medals (10 gold, 10 silver, 5 bronze). The third in the total amount of medals are Russian athletes with 18 medals (9 gold, 6 silver, 3 bronze). Ukraine in the overall standings showed 18 results, winning 1 silver medal (biathlete Elena Petrova).

In 1998, the XVIII Winter Olympic Games in Nagano have become truly iconic for world sports. The fact is that it was on the eve of these Games that the UN General Assembly in a new resolution, for the first time in history, de facto called on countries to suspend all international and internal conflicts. Thus, known from history Ancient Greece the tacit ban on wars during the 1998 Olympics finally received a material basis.

Emblem and mascots of the 1998 Olympics

In addition, the program of the last Winter Games in the 20th century included such rapidly developing sports as snowboard,women's hockey And curling. This was a huge step into the future for the White Olympics, the popularity of which year by year was increasingly inferior to its summer brother, largely due to the lack of new sports. However, the debutants still fell short in their prevalence to the Olympic sports. Both women's hockey, and the art of hitting an icy target with a bat, and skating on a snowboard were practiced to a sufficient extent only in a few countries of the world. Their presence at the Games was explained only by their, oddly enough, entertainment. Yes, yes, television people were primarily interested in the introduction of these sports, at the suggestion of which the IOC made a historic decision.

Winners of the 1998 Olympics

Gold - Czech Republic.
Silver- Russia.
Bronze– Finland.

True, the International Olympic Committee soon decided to protect itself from such pressure by establishing a rule that in the future only those disciplines and sports that are practiced in at least 50 countries on three continents, both among men and women, will be able to enter the program. .

These Olympic Games were held in Japan, and therefore simply could not fail to amaze with scientific and technological achievements worthy of the new XXI century. The Land of the Rising Sun has repeatedly surprised the world with its high technology, and the Nagano Olympics were no exception.

First appeared here sport shoes from kevlar. Athletes were simply amazed by the new skates designed by the Dutch and introduced by the Canadians. Their idea was simple, like all ingenious things: they decided not to attach the blade to the boot tightly, but to make it movable. This small revolution led to the fact that at the XVIII Winter Olympic Games all records fell speed run on skates, and their table had to be rewritten.

Emblem. Flower-six-flower

The emblem of the Olympics in Nagano was a flower, on each petal of which an athlete is depicted - a representative of a particular winter sport. The emblem also looks like a snowflake symbolizing the Winter Olympics. It also resembles a mountain flower, thus emphasizing respect for nature and environmental protection in Nagano. The dynamic nature of this bright and colorful picture speaks to the atmosphere of enthusiasm in which the Games are held, and also symbolizes their magnificence.

Olympic champions - 1998

Goalkeepers: Dominik Hasek, Milan Gnilichka, Roman Cechmanek.
Defenders: Piotr Svoboda, Roman Gamrlik, Jiri Shlegr, Richard Smeglik, Frantisek Kucera, Jaroslav Shpacek, Libor Prochazka.
Forwards: Pavel Patera, Jaromir Jagr, Martin Ruchinskiy, Robert Reichel, Vladimir Ruzicka, Jiri Dopita, Martin Straka, Robert Lang, Martin Prochaska, Josef Beranek, David Moravec, Milan Heyduk, Jan Chalone.

Mascot. snowy owls

No less interesting was the talisman, or rather the mascots of the Games. The wise Japanese chose four "snowlets" as mascots - owls Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki. The word "snowlets" consists of "snow" ( "snow") and "let "s" ( "Let's"). Games are held every four years, so the mascot consists of four owls. Their names were chosen from 47,484 ideas submitted by sports fans.

Preliminary Tournament. Through hardship to the stars

The qualifying tournament for the Olympics consisted of four preliminary stages, during which many curious events took place. The heroes of this marathon were the teams of Kazakhstan and Belarus, which eventually made it to the final eight. Our Central Asian neighbors managed to win the Asian Championship during the qualification, then went through the third round with some difficulty and eventually made a real sensation by not letting strong Slovaks into the main tournament.

The merits of the Belarusians are no less striking. In the second round they won four matches with a total score of 54:4, in the third round they became the first in their group, despite the resistance of the Kazakhstanis, and in the decisive round they left Germany, France and even the host, Japan, out of the Olympics.

IN final tournament Kazakhstan and Belarus joined the superstar teams that had previously placed 1st to 6th at the World Championships. The playoff pairs were supposed to be determined in two groups of four teams, but we will talk about the matches themselves a little later. After all, even before them, a decision was made that changed the fate of this and subsequent Winter Olympics, making them the only competition with the participation of all the strongest hockey players on the planet.

1. The real discovery of the 1998 Olympics was the hockey team of Kazakhstan - the most Russian of all the participants.
2. The US team became the first Olympic champions in women's hockey.

Pioneers of the Wild West

For the first time in more than 80 years of history, the IIHF and the NHL have come to an agreement. Finally, the commissioner of the richest hockey league in the world has decided to announce a break in February, so that all the most deserving have the opportunity to play in Nagano. The leadership of the NHL came to the same obvious conclusion that the Olympics with the participation of all stars would be the best advertisement for the American-Canadian championship. Well, if one of the North American squads won this championship, the ratings of the National League would skyrocket.

In addition, hockey experts have not yet forgotten the magnificent, and most importantly, very effective game of the US and Canadian teams at the World Cup two years ago. "Star-striped" and "maple-haired" hockey players reached the finals at that tournament. That is why the vast majority of overseas experts predicted that these teams would meet in decisive match Japanese Games, defeating all rivals on their way. However, the Russians, Swedes, Finns, and most importantly the Czechs had their own opinion on this matter.

True, that's really someone, but Russian players at this tournament they were definitely not ranked among the favorites. It’s scary to imagine that at the last four world championships we couldn’t even win bronze, and in the IIHF rankings we occupied a very unassuming sixth place.

At the same World Cup, we performed well for that time, reaching the semi-finals. But the conflict between the Russian Hockey Federation and the Russian Enkhaelites has grown simply to unimaginable proportions. We will not now return to the various accusations that the parties made against each other. Who was right then, who is wrong, now it does not matter at all.

Disputes are forgotten, but the facts remain, and they were not at all in our favor. While in other national teams the players were simply torn to the Olympics, our hockey players began to massively refuse to participate in it. The main sporting event of the four years decided to miss Vyacheslav Fetisov, Nikolai Khabibulin, Igor Larionov, Alexander Mogilny, Sergey Zubov, Vyacheslav Kozlov. Many others, in particular Alexander Karpovtsev, Alexey Kovalev And Andrey Nikolishin, were injured shortly before the Games.

The real trouble we had with the goalkeepers. Khabibulin, who did not go to the tournament, was the only main NHL goalkeeper from Russia. "Compilations" Mikhail Shtalenkov And Andrey Trefilov had very little experience of matches in the strongest league in the world, and they had little game practice.

And yet we also had guys who were able to defend the honor of the national sport. Both brothers arrived bure, Alexey Zhamnov, Sergei Gonchar, Alexey Yashin, Andrey Kovalenko, Sergei Fedorov. With such guys, even without half of our star line-up, we were knee-deep in the Sea of Japan, and Fujiyama was on the shoulder.

Russian team
Goalkeepers: Mikhail Shtalenkov, Andrey Trefilov, Oleg Shevtsov.
Defenders: Dmitry Mironov, Sergey Gonchar, Alexei Zhitnik, Darius Kasparaitis, Igor Kravchuk, Boris Mironov, Alexei Gusarov, Dmitry Yushkevich.
Forwards: Pavel Bure, Alexei Yashin, Sergei Fedorov, Andrei Kovalenko, Alexei Morozov, Alexei Zhamnov, Valery Zelepukin, Valery Kamensky, Valery Bure, Sergei Nemchinov, German Titov, Sergei Krivokrasov.
Coaches: Vladimir Yurzinov, Pyotr Vorobyov, Zinetula Bilyaletdinov.

Main Tournament. Revenge of the Dominator

Our group at the Olympic tournament was considered much weaker than the parallel four. Experts believed that only the favor of fate saved us from meeting with the Americans and Canadians, who were among the favorites, as well as strong Swedes. However, as it turned out later, it was in our “light” group that all future Olympic medalists gathered. It all started for Russian team more than successful. In battles for the honor of the tricolor, wingmen Vladimir Yurzinov The Olympians first smashed the Kazakhs 9:2, then snatched a strong-willed victory from the Finns 4:3 and managed to defeat the Czech team 2:1.

In the last match after the second period we lost 0:1 and for a long time tried to win back. However, the famous Czech goalkeeper Dominik Hasek was just phenomenal. He fought off everything that flew into his gates, but after all, this could not last forever. As a result, Alexey Zhamnov and Valery Bure still broke through the legendary Czech.

And in the other group, meanwhile, the US team, having lost to the Swedes in the first round, remained only in third place, thus securing a meeting with Hasek and company. As it turned out, provided for their misfortune. There were only two unpredictable fights in the quarterfinals: the northern derby of Sweden and Finland, which ended with the victory of the Suomi team, and just the game of the Czech Republic with the States. In this meeting, the team led by Jaromir Jagr and Dominator missed the first, but in the second game segment she defeated the Americans, and in the third she only strengthened her success - 4:1. Russia and Canada, by the way, expectedly outplayed the Belarusians and Kazakhstanis with the same score, respectively.

In the first semi-final, the Czechs, who have already proved that they are a formidable force, managed not to lose to the Canadians either in regular time or in overtime. And in the shootout, even the founders of hockey failed to resist Hasek. The Russians and Finns, in turn, gave a real scoring extravaganza. Until the score 4:4, the game went on like a swing, but in the final twenty-minute period, he scored the fifth goal of our team Andrey Kovalenko, and then we finished off the opponent with two more goals. It should be noted that five out of seven goals in the Russians were scored by Pavel Bure, who was later recognized as the best striker and sniper of the tournament.

The duel for bronze medals, the upset Canadians, almost without resistance, lost to the Finns 3:2. But in the final meeting, our team, which already achieved more than expected from it, did not succeed against the Czech Republic. The scenario of this game was very similar to the first match of the Slavic squads in the tournament. All the same mass attacks of the Russians, all the same goal scored by the Czechs, and the same impregnability of the goalkeeper, who never conceded.

After this meeting, none of the Russian players had a smile on their face, despite the undoubted success - won silver. The missed goal was completely optional. After a throw-in in our zone, the Czechs won the puck and brought the defender to the throw. He threw, and the projectile ricocheted from the hand of our striker into the goal. A shameful defeat, for which we avenged four years later in Salt Lake City, but did not win the Olympics.

Women's league

For the first time in the history of the Olympic Games, a women's ice hockey tournament was organized. According to the results of the Women's World Cup, four strongest teams and China, as well as host Japan, played one-on-one round-robin games. According to the results of the tournament, the teams that took third and fourth places played the match for third place, and the teams that took first and second places played the final match. In the decisive confrontation, the Americans outplayed the Canadian team 3:1, and in the game for bronze, the Finnish team defeated the Chinese women 4:1.

Despite the small list of participants, the games showed a serious breakthrough in this sport, and it was hoped that this event would help attract large financial revenues.

Interesting Facts

These Games were not without scandal. Angry with the failure, American hockey players staged a brawl and broke furniture in their rooms in Olympic village causing material and moral damage to the organizers.

The most "Russian" team at the tournament was the national team of Kazakhstan, all of whose players were ethnic Russians. But the Russian national team included a Ukrainian and a Lithuanian.

Before the start of the Games, the NHL leadership decided to hold several exhibition matches to instill an interest in hockey among the Japanese. After that, the impressionable Asians, according to rumors, simply “fell ill” with a game with a stick and a puck. They understood the rules with difficulty, but they maintained the atmosphere great.

The best goalkeeper of the tournament, Dominik Hasek, kept a clean sheet only in the first and last matches championship.

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Long before the start of the XVIII Winter Olympic Games, experts predicted that any country would need 11-12 gold medals to win a team victory in Nagano. And this prediction was completely justified. After the competitions in all 68 numbers of the program ended. The German delegation had 12 medals of the highest standard, Norway - 10, Russia - 9.

Russian skiers achieved a phenomenal, unprecedented success in Olympic history, winning all five races on the most difficult tracks in Hakuba. Larisa Lazutina brought three gold medals - two for victories in individual races and one in the relay race, as well as silver and bronze medals from Japan to the city of Odintsovo near Moscow. This athlete accomplished a real feat, for which, immediately upon her return to her homeland, she was awarded the title "Hero of the Russian Federation" by the Decree of the President of the country.

The representative of the Vladimir region Olga Danilova returned from Japan as a two-time Olympic champion. It was she who, ahead of her rivals at a 15-kilometer distance, won the first gold medal played in Nagano and gave additional confidence to her teammates, with whom she excelled in the relay race.

The real discovery of the Games was Yulia Chepalova. The victory in the 30 km race of this young Muscovite, who was born in Komsomolsk-on-Amur and studied at the Khabarovsk State Institute of Physical Culture, was, of course, unexpected for many. But only for the coaches: they saw Yulia as the future leader of our women's ski team.

Elena Vyalbe and Nina Gavrylyuk deserve special words of gratitude. They failed to win the individual races. But they shone on their stages of the relay and deservedly received gold medals. From now on, both Elena and Nina are three-time Olympic champions, since Gavrylyuk in 1988 and 1994, and Vyalbe in 1992 and 1994 already shared the joy of victory in relay races with their friends.

Figure skaters contributed three gold medals to the common treasury. This is certainly an outstanding achievement. Oksana Kazakova and Artur Dmitriev became champions in pair skating, Pasha Grischuk and Evgeny Platov in ice dancing, and Ilya Kulik in men's singles. All of them showed the highest skill and fortitude. Only after the end of the competition did it become clear, for example, that Grischuk competed with a broken wrist! She and her wonderful partner were the first in history to win two Winter Olympics in a row.

Photo: AFP

So, 11 Russian athletes became champions of the XVIII Winter Olympic Games.

Information provided by the Russian Olympic Committee.