Olympia 2022: From Althaus to Valiewa: The faces of the Winter Games

Cheering sky high and saddened to death: Katharina Althaus will certainly not forget the Winter Games in Beijing. On the very first day of the games she won the first German medal in ski jumping, and a few days later she was stunned. At the first mixed competition in ski jumping, Althaus, like four other women, was disqualified because a suit was too big. The dream of the second medal was gone, Althaus had jumped in the same suit as a few days before. The criticism of the FIS and the jury was great, the first scandal of the games in Beijing was quickly written. Althaus was happy about the silver and frustrated about the jury.

But other nations also experienced ups and downs: There was Mikaela Shiffrin, who was eliminated early in each of her three parade disciplines and had to leave China for the USA without a single medal. There was the Norwegian Johannes Thingnes Bö, who was hard to beat in biathlon and won four gold medals. Or Zoi Sadowksi-Synnott, who put a whole country into winter sports euphoria. The 21-year-old clinched New Zealand’s first gold medal in the history of the Winter Games, with Nico Porteous another New Zealander once again winning the coveted medal at the end of the Games. One of the most formative stories, however, will remain the tragedy about figure skating super talent Kamila Valiewa. Convicted of doping, the superstar botched the freestyle and was “only” fourth in a top-class field. Trainer Eteri Tutberidze publicly accused the 15-year-old of failure in front of the world and did not even want to allow criticism of her training style and the doping offense to arise. The fact that even the IOC, in the form of President Thomas Bach, intervened and criticized the Russian behavior says a lot about the Valiyeva case, which will continue to concern the world after the games.