Winter Olympics

The Saddledome, Stampede Park, Calgary, Alberta, western Canada. The Saddledome, which is equipped for ice hockey and figure-skating, was built for the 1988 Winter Olympics.

A four-crew bobsleigh team ready for a race. The team consists of a driver, two side pushers, and a brake operator. Once away from the start, the team work together to keep an aerodynamic profile in the toboggan, transferring their bodyweight for maximum speed when cornering.

Ice hockey is a fast and furious game in which two teams of six players aim to score points by hitting a small rubber puck into the opposing team's goal using wooden sticks. A game is divided into three periods of twenty minutes. Ice hockey is an Olympic sport.

Men's short track speed skating. The competitors race around a track over distances of 500–3000 m/1650–9,800 ft in individual races, relays, or pursuit races.

In pairs figure skating competitors perform compulsory movements and free routines to music that they have selected. Marks are given for both technical merit, and artistic impression.

Series of sports competitions held every four years on snow and ice, first held in 1924, and organized like the Summer Olympics under the auspices of the International Olympic Committee.

Although figure skating became an Olympic sport at the 1908 London Games and ice hockey was added in 1920, the first separate, self-contained Winter Olympic Games were held at Chamonix, France, in 1924, when 258 competitors from 16 nations competed for medals in Nordic skiing, ski jumping, ice hockey, four-man bobsledding, and figure and speed skating. Alpine skiing was not introduced until 1936. Other sports to be introduced as medal events at subsequent games were biathlon in 1960, luge in 1964, ice dancing in 1976, freestyle skiing in 1992, snowboarding and curling in 1998, and skeleton in 2002. The 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, saw over 2,600 athletes from a record 80 countries taking part. The 2010 Games will be held in Vancouver, Canada.