The Winter Olympics are starting this Friday, February 6, and lasting until February 22, 2026. These events will be taking place in Milan, Italy, and the surrounding areas. Viewers can watch on either NBC or Peacock.
The Winter Olympics are home to competitions in 16 sports and various events revolving around ice and snow. These sports include alpine skiing, biathlon, bobsleigh, cross-country skiing, curling, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hockey, luge, nordic combined, short track speed skating, skeleton, ski jumping, snowboarding, and speed skating. Ski mountaineering, otherwise known as skimo, is the final sport that will have its Olympic debut this year.
New Additions
Ski mountaineering includes a mixture of uphill mountain climbing and downhill skiing. Additionally, there will be 3 events: a mixed relay, a men’s sprint, and a women’s sprint. A vote to add this sport to the Olympics was held in 2021 after it was included in the 2020 Youth Winter Olympic Games.
While there is only one new sport being introduced to these Olympics, there are multiple new events found across numerous sports.
Luge is a fast-paced sport where participants lie flat on their backs, feet first, on a flat sled. They then sled down an ice-covered track while navigating turns through slight body movements. There is currently a mixed team relay and a traditional open doubles, which has only ever had male competitors. The new event in Luge will be a women’s doubles, which will be the first women-specific Olympic luge event.
Skeleton is another fast sledding sport. The main difference between skeleton and luge is that skeleton competitors sprint to their sleds and go down the track head-first and on their stomachs, as opposed to luge’s feet-first and lying on back approach. This sport will be adding a mixed team relay event.
Alpine skiing will be adding a team combined event, which does differ from its super combined event. Both events contain a downhill run and a slalom run. However, in team combined, one competitor is assigned to one run, whereas in super combined, both competitors do each run, and their cumulative time is what is measured.
Freestyle skiing is seeing the addition of men’s and women’s dual moguls. This event will feature two skiers going down adjacent moguls simultaneously. Advancements are decided based on whichever skier has more judges on their side by the end of the round.
Ski jumping will be adding a women’s large hill event, where the women will compete on the same hills as the men’s event.
Rule Changes
Individual Neutral Athletes (AINs) are athletes who are not allowed to represent their country but can still participate in the Olympics due to sanctions. These athletes are most notably from Russia and Belarus. While they can still participate in the competition, they cannot use national symbols, flags, or anthems to represent their country.
However, rules surrounding these AINs are changing for the upcoming winter games. Most notably, there will be a lessening of the media ban through the International Skating Union (ISU). By decreasing the restrictions of this media ban, AINs will now be allowed to talk to the media and participate in press conferences.
For ice hockey, neck guards will now be mandatory for all players. This is mainly due to the death of player Adam Johnson, who died shortly after taking a skate blade to the neck during a game.
Senior Sophie Best, ’26, gives her opinion on this change, stating, “I think requiring neck guards in the Olympics is a fantastic idea. Hockey is an aggressive sport, and with the added protection, it stops accidents on the ice from happening.”
This brings up another change regarding the ice hockey tournament. NHL players have not played in the Winter Olympics since 2014 in Sochi, Russia. These Olympics will mark the first time in 12 years that NHL players have been allowed to participate.
While there are no rules that have been designed to create gender balance for the upcoming Olympic Games, many of the new events were added with this goal in mind. Take notice that all of the new events are either mixed or are women’s events that often compare exactly to the men’s event.
“It’s great to see that they added more women’s events that men already had. Seeing how women went from only being allowed to participate in figure skating to all these sports makes me proud and excited to see what is to come!
— Maricel Cancel, '26
.sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 { display: flex; float: left; margin: 30px 30px 30px 0; width: 50%; border-color: #888888; border-top-width: 5px; border-right-width: 5px; border-bottom-width: 5px; border-left-width: 5px; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 p.pullquotetext, .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 p.quotespeaker { } .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 .pullquotepic { width: 33%; margin-left: 25px; } .sno-story-body .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 p.pullquotetext { font-size: 22px; line-height: 1.4em; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 .quotebar { background: #dddddd; flex: 0 0 90px; margin-top: -15px; margin-left: -15px; padding-left: 15px; padding-top: 15px; margin-right: 15px; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 .largequote { color: #888888; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb86690d8 .quotebody { width: unset; }Notable Athletes
Ilia Malinin is an accomplished figure skater who will be making his first Olympic appearance for Team USA. He has been deemed “the Quad God” after he became the first skater to land a quad axel in competition in 2022. Malinin’s parents were both Olympic skaters for Uzbekistan, and he is a back-to-back world skating champion (2024 and 2025).
Eileen Gu is a Chinese-American freestyle skier. Although she was born in the United States, she chose to compete in international competitions (including these 2026 Olympics) for the People’s Republic of China. She has an impressive record of winning two world championships, three Winter X Games championships, and two Winter Youth Olympic gold medals. In addition to this, she has broken numerous Olympic records, such as becoming the first freestyle skier to win three medals in one Olympic Game.
Chloe Kim is a phenomenal snowboarder who will be participating on behalf of Team USA. At age 17, she participated in her first Olympic Games in 2018, where she won a gold medal in the women’s halfpipe. This made her the youngest woman to win an Olympic gold medal in snowboarding. Then, at the next Olympics in 2022, she, yet again, won gold, which made her the first woman to win back-to-back gold medals in the halfpipe event. Kim has numerous gold medals from different competitions, and viewers are excited to see what she will accomplish this time.
“Sidney Crosby is a natural born leader and has been a mentor to countless players who look up to him, particularly rookie Macklin Celebrini. Crosby being named captain is a huge accomplishment, and his leadership skills and experience will set Team Canada up for success.
— Sophie Best, '26
.sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 { display: flex; float: right; margin: 30px 0 30px 30px; width: 50%; border-color: #888888; border-top-width: 5px; border-right-width: 5px; border-bottom-width: 5px; border-left-width: 5px; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 p.pullquotetext, .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 p.quotespeaker { } .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 .pullquotepic { width: 33%; margin-left: 25px; } .sno-story-body .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 p.pullquotetext { font-size: 22px; line-height: 1.4em; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 .quotebar { background: #dddddd; flex: 0 0 90px; margin-top: -15px; margin-left: -15px; padding-left: 15px; padding-top: 15px; margin-right: 15px; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 .largequote { color: #888888; } .sno-pullquote-698ccb8669798 .quotebody { width: unset; }Sidney Crosby is coming back to the Winter Olympics for the first time since 2014 to captain the Canadian Men’s Ice Hockey team. Crosby is currently in his 21st National Hockey League season as captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins and has had 2 Olympic appearances, both of which he won gold. He is also a three-time Stanley Cup champion and became the first player to captain teams to an Olympic gold medal, a world championship, and a Stanley Cup.
Hilary Knight, captain of the Seattle Torrent and decorated hockey veteran, has been named captain of the United States Olympic women’s ice hockey team. Knight has had an impressive career with 10 gold medals in the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), the most that any single hockey player has, and four Olympic medals. Knight has also been an activist for the LGBTQ+ community and for equal pay and treatment for women in sports. This is set to be her fifth and last Olympic appearance.
Stay tuned for more on the Olympics.