Watch winter olympic Short Track Speed Skating 2018 Live TV>>>>




Beginning February 9, athletes from around the world will flock to Pyeongchang—a rugged, mountainous region in the Gangwon Province of South Korea—for the 2018 Winter Olympics.To prepare for the games, South Korea has built six new venues and refurbished six others in three different areas in the province: Pyeongchang, an area known for winter sports and home to the Olympic Stadium; Jeongseon, a former mining area home to the downhill skiing courses; and Gangneung, a resort town and bustling port city home to the ice skating, speed skating, and hockey arenas.Like any Olympics, Pyeongchang has made a few thorny headlines in the lead-up to the Games. Escalating military tension might be scaring away tourists, organizers have banned Russia from competing, and some worry that Pyeongchang’s frigid temperatures could pose problems for both athletes and spectators.The good news? Officials report that all 13 venues and the Olympic Village are ready to go, an impressive feat considering that organizers of the recent Sochi and Rio Games were scrambling to finish hotels and venues on time.In addition to the new venues, many Olympic athletes and visitors will arrive in Gangwon Province on a new $3.7 billion express train that just opened between Seoul and Pyeongchang. Instead of a taxing three-hour drive, the Korail train journey will take just under 1.5 hours.To get pumped for all the excitement to come, we’ve rounded up the details and best photos of the major Olympic venues. From a giant stadium to snow-covered ski runs, here’s where all the Olympic magic will happen. Built to hold 35,000 people, the pentagonal Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium will host the opening and closing ceremonies at the Olympics. Located about one mile northeast of Alpensia Ski Resort, the stadium is a temporary structure that will be dismantled after the Olympics are over.In recent months, the stadium has come under criticism because it was built without a roof or heat to save time and money. In November, seven people reportedly suffered hypothermia while attending a concert at the stadium. In order to alleviate the freezing temperatures and cold winds forecasted during the Olympics, officials will provide each spectator at the opening and closing ceremonies with a small blanket, a rain coat, and a heating pad. Athletes competing in Pyeongchang will stay in the Olympic Village located near the main stadium. The village will officially open on February 1, eight days before the opening ceremony. The compound includes eight apartment buildings—each 15 stories tall—with about 600 units total.A residential area is supplemented by an athletes’ plaza, and the village also includes important day-to-day services like banks, post offices, convenience stories, fitness centers, and multifaith churches. A similar Olympic Village in Gangneung has nine apartment buildings with a total of 922 units. A nexus of many different sports for the Olympics in the Pyeongchang Mountain Cluster, the Alpensia Sports Complex at Alpensia Ski Resort is home to the biathlon, cross-country skiing, and ski jumping centers. In total, South Korea has spent more than $1.5 billion on Alpensia and structures like the ski jumping center, which was completed in 2008 and features two different sloping ramps. Also located in the Pyeongchang Mountain Cluster, the 44-acre Olympic Sliding Center has several snaking chutes for bobsled, skeleton, and luge events. Constructed at a cost of $114.5 million, it was one of the last venues to complete, wrapping up in late 2017. All of the freestyle skiing and snowboard competitions will take place at the Phoenix Snow Park in the township of Bongpyeong-myeon. The facility sits at the foot of Mt. Taegi and includes mogul courses, big air jumps, and a half pipe. With seating for 6,500 and room for another 2,900 standing spectators, the Jeongseon Alpine Center is home base for both men’s and women’s downhill, super-G, and Alpine combined ski events. It sits in the Gariwang mountains—one of the most remote areas in South Korea—and already hosted World Cup skiing events in 2016 and 2017. Still in the Pyeongchang Mountain Cluster but located at Yongpyong Resort instead of Alpensia Ski Resort, the Yongpyong Alpine Center will host all of the slalom events. The top of the mountain stands 4,783 feet above sea level and has a vertical drop of 2,530 feet. One of two homes for Olympic hockey at this winter’s games, the Kwandong Hockey Center sits on a Catholic university campus and offers an intimate venue for 6,000 Olympic spectators. The Kwandong Hockey Center is part of five indoor arenas located in the coastal region of Gangneung.Instead of building a completely new venue for the curling events, Olympic officials decided to renovate an existing building in 2015 and 2016. Inside, four ice curling sheets painted with bullseyes will host the world’s best curlers. A new structure built specifically for the Olympics, the Gangneung Hockey Center was completed in 2017. The octagonal stadium fits 10,000 people and will host the men’s and women’s team hockey tournaments. The Gangneung Ice Arena is center stage for the exciting short-track speed skating races as well as the ever-popular figure skating competitions. At night, the building’s exterior lights up to reveal changing colors. This oval building seats 8,000 spectators and boasts a 400-meter double track. It’s the place to be if you’re watching any of the long-track speed skating events.How it works

Depending on the event, four or six skaters race around a tight oval track . With speeds reaching 30mph, crashes are commonplace. Overtaking is allowed but there are strict rules on impeding opponents. Races are held over 500m, 1,000m and 1500m, and there is also a men's and women's relay. It's a knockout format, with the fastest two or three skaters per race qualifying for the next round.Anything new since Sochi 2014?Elise Christie is the reigning overall world champion and a good bet to become the first British woman to win an Olympic short track medal. That would make amends for 2014, when she was also a medal contender but had a nightmare experience and was disqualified in all three of her events.Short track is South Korea's most successful Olympic sport, producing 21 of their 26 golds, and the hosts' contenders will include Choi Min-jeong. Look out for Canadian couple Charles Hamelin and Marianne St-Gelais - with seven medals between them - whose post-race embraces in 2010 and 2014 captured hearts worldwide. Talking of romance, Elise Christie's boyfriend Sandor Liu Shaolin could win Hungary's first Winter Games medal for 38 years. His brother Shaoang is also a medal contender.I didn't know that...steven Bradbury experienced the highs and lows of short track - in 1992, the Australian lost four litres of blood and needed 111 stitches after a rival's skate ended up in his leg. He later broke his neck in a track crash.But in 2002, he won one of the most famous short track races in Olympic history - he was trailing way off the pace in last place in the 1,000m final in Salt Lake City when a last-corner pile-up took out the four skaters in front of him, leaving him to cruise over the line to claim an unlikely gold.Marking another technological advancement for NBC Olympics, NBCUniversal’s comprehensive coverage of the XXIII Olympic Winter Games from PyeongChang, South Korea, will include the availability of 4K High Dynamic Range (HDR) to cable, satellite, telco providers, and other partners.NBC Olympics’ 4K HDR offering will be the first time robust coverage of the Winter Olympics or any Olympic Games competition sessions have been presented in 4K High Dynamic Range in the United States. The presentation will be the second consecutive time NBC has delivered coverage of the Olympic Games in 4K. NBC Olympics first delivered coverage of the Olympic Games in 4K during last summer’s presentation of the Rio Olympics, when NBC distributed the Games in 4K Ultra High Definition (UHD).Xfinity is the presenting sponsor of NBC Olympics’ 4K HDR coverage of the PyeongChang Games.“The Olympics has always been a platform for the introduction of new broadcast technology,” said Gary Zenkel, President, NBC Olympics. “The availability of 4K High Dynamic Range coverage of Olympic ceremonies and competitions through our participating multi-channel distribution partners, will be a great showcase for this emerging advancement in the quality of televised sports coverage in the United States.Providing the highest quality viewing experiences on the TV and across devices for the biggest and best moments in sports and entertainment has always been our top priority,” said Matthew Strauss, Executive Vice President, Xfinity Services. “The Olympics brings us together unlike any event to experience the incredible emotions and heart-pounding moments that take our breath away, and we are proud to partner with NBCUniversal to bring the Winter Games to viewers across the country in pristine 4K HDR for the first time.”NBC Olympics will distribute the 4K HDR coverage, provided by Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) and Japan’s NHK, to U.S. distribution partners who will individually choose how they will make the content available to their customers.This is yet another first at an Olympic Games, and OBS is proud to continually provide and facilitate the very latest technology to its broadcast partners,” said Yiannis Exarchos, Chief Executive Officer, Olympic Broadcasting Services. “The performances of the best athletes in the World deserve to be captured with the best broadcast technology available.NBC’s 4K HDR coverage of the PyeongChang Games will be made available on delay, and will include 4K footage from the Opening Ceremony, hockey, figure skating, short track speed skating, ski jumping, and snowboard big air competitions. Up to four events from the previous day’s competition will be provided daily from February 10, the day after the Opening Ceremony, through February 26, the day after the Games conclude.

4K HDR technology displays images at over 8 million pixels (3,840 x 2,160), providing pictures with a high resolution that is roughly four times that of current HD (1,920 x 1,080 pixels). In addition, 4K HDR allows for a Wide Color Gamut (WCG) presentation, expanding the range of both color and contrast, which provides a wider and richer range of colors delivered to viewers.NBC’s primetime coverage of The Winter Olympics begins Feb. 8, 2018.Hong Kong will have an athlete competing on snow for the first time at a Winter Olympics after 16-year-old Alpine Skier Arabella Ng secured her place for next month’s Pyeongchang Games.The U.S.-based student will be Hong Kong’s sole athlete in South Korea.She will also be only the sixth to represent the Chinese territory at a Winter Games and the first on snow rather than ice -- the previous five all being short-track speed skaters.We want to make sure she gains as much experience as possible from being there,” Hong Kong Ski Association secretary general Samson Siu told the South China Morning Post after qualification was confirmed.She’ll be wearing the Hong Kong Olympic uniform... the Olympic Committee already had that prepared.Siu said the aim was to send a bigger team to the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022.Hong Kong-born Ng has qualified to compete in both the slalom and giant slalom.Hong Kong has never won a medal at a Winter Olympics. The Games start on Feb. 9. South Korean-born Russian short track speed skating star Victor An will not be allowed to compete at the upcoming Winter Olympic Games, reports said Tuesday, presumably due to alleged links to Russia's state-sponsored doping scandal.Citing an anonymous source, Russia's TASS news agency reported that An is not included in the list of Russian athletes heading to PyeongChang. RIA Novosti also said the Russian Olympic Committee confirmed An's absence from the 2018 Winter Games.While the grounds for his exclusion were not immediately made known, it is presumed that An was implicated in the state-led doping scandal.Born Ahn Hyun-soo in South Korea, the living legend currently has six gold medals to his name, three of which are from the 2006 Winter Games in Torino, when he was still a South Korean national.Following factional feuds within South Korea's national skating federation, An won Russian citizenship in 2011 in a bid to find a new home where he could focus on his training. An shot to stardom in his new home by grabbing three more gold medals at the Sochi Winter Olympics.An has won more Olympic gold medals in short track than anyone in history.Still active, he was widely expected to visit the Winter Games hosted in his original home country for his swan song after winning a silver medal in the men's 500 meters at the 2018 European Championships earlier this month.But his career apparently faces another hurdle.In December, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) banned Russia from taking part in the PyeongChang Winter Olympics following an alleged state-led doping scandal. Instead, athletes without traces of unapproved drugs were welcomed to participate as Olympic Athletes from Russia.The Russian flag and anthem, however, are still banned at the games.Earlier this month, the IOC said it carried out "extra scrutiny" on athletes from Russia in order to ensure drug-free competition.The so-called McLaren report revealed that more than 1,000 Russian athletes were involved in a large-scale, systematic doping program over five years, a time period covering the Sochi Winter Olympics in Russia. An administrative oversight has cost a South Korean speed skater a spot in next month's PyeongChang Winter Olympics.The Korea Skating Union said Tuesday that Noh Seon-yeong, initially picked to represent the host country in the women's team pursuit event, will be ineligible for the competition.At the national Olympic trials last October, Noh was selected, along with Kim Bo-reum and Park Ji-woo, for the team pursuit. As the host country, South Korea received an automatic spot in the team pursuit.But under the Olympic qualification rules by the International Skating Union, all skaters competing in team pursuit must also have qualified for at least one individual race. While Kim and Park also earned Olympic berths in the mass start based on their performances during the ISU World Cup season, Noh only made the reserve list in the women's 1,500 meters.An official at the KSU claimed there was a mix-up in communication with the ISU, saying the South Korean federation was only belatedly informed that all skaters in the team pursuit must also have qualified for an individual event.The official said the KSU sent an email to the ISU to complain about the confusion. Noh received the news of her ineligibility on Saturday.South Korea will now have to scramble to fill Noh's absence in the 2,400-meter race.Three skaters who have individual Olympic spots are Lee Sang-hwa, Park Seung-hi and Kim Hyun-yung. They're all short-distance specialists, and they won't have nearly enough time to develop chemistry with Kim Bo-reum and Park Ji-woo anyway. Lee Sang-hwa isn't really an option because she will be contending for her third straight gold medal in the 500m."This is a pretty bad situation, but we'll try to prepare for the Olympics the best we can," said national speed skating head coach Baek Chul-gi. "We'll pick either Park Seung-hi or Kim Hyun-yung to compete in the team pursuit.Noh is an older sister of former short track star Noh Jin-kyu, who died of bone cancer in 2016. When she was selected for the national team, Noh Seon-yeong spoke of her desire to dedicate her Olympic performance to her late brother.Russia's Viktor Ahn, the most decorated Olympic short track speed skater, has been barred from competing at next month's Pyeongchang Winter Games in his native South Korea, the TASS news agency has reported.Born Ahn Hyun-soo in Seoul, the skater won three gold medals and a bronze at the 2006 Turin Games for South Korea but was passed over for Vancouver four years later due to a knee injury and after falling out with Korea's skating union.Ahn then gave up his South Korean passport and switched allegiance to Russia in 2011 and returned to Olympic ice with a vengeance in Sochi in 2014, winning three more golds and a bronze.Ahn has been barred from participation in the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang," TASS quoted a source familiar with the matter as saying late on Monday. "His team mates Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev have also been barred.The report did not provide any reason for Ahn's exclusion from the Games.The participation of Russian athletes at the 2018 Games has been under a cloud after widespread doping at the Sochi Winter Games was exposed by an independent report for the World Anti-Doping Agency.The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has banned Russia from the Feb 9-25 Pyeongchang Games as a result of its "unprecedented systematic manipulation" of the anti-doping system.It left the door open for Russian athletes with a clean doping history to be invited to compete as neutrals under an Olympic flag, however.On Friday, the IOC said it had reduced the pool of Russian athletes eligible to compete at next month's Pyeongchang winter Olympics to 389 from 500.Russian short track speed skater Viktor Ahn, biathlete Anton Shipulin and cross-country skier Sergei Ustyugov are not on the list of athletes eligible for next month’s Pyeongchang Winter Games, the Russian Olympic Committee said on Tuesday. The committee’s vice president, Stanislav Pozdnyakov, said in a statement the three had not been included in the pool from which Russian competitors will be invited to compete in Pyeongchang by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).The IOC last month banned Russia from Pyeongchang over “systematic manipulation” of the anti-doping system at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, but left the door open to athletes with no history of doping to compete as “Olympic Athletes from Russia”.“Athletes like Viktor Ahn, Anton Shipulin and Sergei Ustyugov were not involved in the Oswald commission proceedings,” Pozdnyakov said in the statement, referring to an IOC commission investigating alleged doping violations by Russian athletes at the 2014 Sochi Games.“They were never involved in doping stories and the many tests they passed over their careers have showed that they are clean athletes. Nevertheless their names are absent from the list of potential Olympic participants.The statement added that the Russian Olympic Committee would request explanations from the IOC regarding the exclusion of “national team leaders in a number of sports. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow regretted that the three athletes were not considered eligible for Pyeongchang.We have heard this saddening news in the media. If this decision has indeed been made, we regret to hear it. We hope for clarity in this situation,” Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

Ahn, who was born in South Korea, won three gold medals and a bronze at the 2006 Turin Games for his native country but was passed over for Vancouver four years later due to a knee injury and after falling out with his country’s skating union.The 32-year-old switched allegiance to Russia in 2011 and went on to win three gold medals and a bronze at the 2014 Sochi Olympics.Shipulin, 30, won bronze in the biathlon relay at Vancouver in 2014 and gold in the relay at Sochi in 2014.He could not immediately be reached for comment.Ustyugov, 25, won gold in the 30 km skiathlon and the team sprint at the 2017 world championships.The IOC last week reduced the pool of Russian athletes eligible to compete at Pyeongchang to 389 from 500. Russia says it seeking clarification from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) after what President Vladimir Putin's spokesman called "deplorable" indications that six-time Olympic gold medalist Viktor Ahn and other prominent athletes Moscow claims are clean have been barred from competing in the Winter Olympics in February.The Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) said on January 23 that short-track speed skater Ahn -- as well as cross-country skier Sergei Ustyugov and biathlete Anton Shipulin, both reigning world champions -- were not in an International Olympic Committee (IOC) pool of Russian athletes who are potentially eligible to compete at the games in Ahn's native South Korea.In December, the IOC banned Russia from the February 9-25 Winter Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea, citing its "unprecedented systematic manipulation" of the Olympic anti-doping system. But it said that some Russians would be allowed to compete as neutral athletes provided they meet certain guidelines on doping.The IOC said on January 19 that it had reduced the pool of Russian athletes eligible to potentially compete to 389 from 500.It said that Russia could begin proposing for specific athletes in the pool to be cleared to take part, and indicated that a final decision on which Russians could compete could come on January 27.ROC Vice President Stanislav Pozdnyakov said that he discovered the absence of athletes including Ahn, Ustyugov, and Shipulin from the pool during negotiations with IOC officials on January 22, and asked the IOC to explain why they were not included.He said that "multiple samples taken throughout their careers" had shown that the three were "clean athletes.Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on January 23 that Russia was seeking clarity from the IOC.We have seen those deplorable reports in the media. We deeply regret if such decisions have indeed been taken. But we hope the situation will be cleared up because we do have contacts with the IOC," he said. "We hope those contacts will help clarify the situation around the aforementioned prominent athletes.Russian officials deny state-sponsored doping, despite voluminous evidence.Born Ahn Hyun-soo in Seoul, Ahn won three gold medals and a bronze for South Korea at the 2006 Olympics in Turin.After falling out with his country's skating union, Ahn gave up his South Korean passport and switched allegiance to Russia in the run-up to the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, where he won three golds and a bronze.Six-time Olympic gold medallist Viktor Ahn of Russia has been banned from the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang.The 32-year-old short-track speed skater was "absent from the list of potential participants," said Stanislav Pozdnyakov, vice-president of the Russian Olympic Committee.Russia has been banned from competing at the Games in South Korea by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).Russian athletes who can prove they are clean can compete under a neutral flag.The ban on Russia follows an investigation into allegations of state-sponsored doping at the 2014 Games hosted by Russia in Sochi.A list of 389 Russians who could potentially compete as neutrals in Pyeongchang has been finalised by the IOC but a final decision on competitors will not be made until 27 January - 13 days before the Winter Olympics begin.Ahn was born in South Korea and won three gold medals at the 2006 Turin Games before switching allegiances to Russia and winning three more at the most recent Games four years ago.He, along with Olympic champion biathlete Anton Shipulin and world champion skier Sergey Ustyugov, are not on the list of eligible athletes.Figure skaters Ksenia Stolbova and Ivan Bukin have also been banned.

Pozdnyakov added: "They were never involved in doping stories and the many tests they passed over their careers have showed that they are clean athletes.On Tuesday, we will send the IOC a request for the specific reasons why the captains of Russian teams in various sports have not been included in the list of potential participants."Meanwhile, the Korea Skating Union is "urgently" investigating allegations that a coach assaulted short-track gold medallist Shim Sukhee.Shim, 20, won gold in the 3,000m team relay in 2014 and is captain of the women's team, and an independent commission will rule whether punishment for the coach is appropriate or not.Korean news agency Yonhap News reported on Friday that Shim had resumed training following the alleged incident.Six-time Olympic gold medalist Viktor Ahn will likely miss the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang as he has not been included in a list of eligible Russian athletes compiled by the International Olympic Committee.Russian media reported Tuesday that he is not among the pool from which Russian athletes will be invited to compete in Pyeongchang as "Olympic athletes.The IOC banned Russia from next month's Olympics due to "systematic manipulation" of the anti-doping system during the 2014 Olympics in Sochi but granted leniency to some individual athletes not suspected of doping. This is copyrighted material owned by Digital Chosun Inc. No part of it may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.The exclusion is reportedly because his name was mentioned in the McLaren Report.The independent report was released by professor Richard McLaren of Western University in Canada, who was commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate allegations of state-sponsored doping in Russian sports.According to the investigation, Russia gave banned drugs to athletes from 2011 to 2015 and tampered with or discarded more than 1,000 test samples. The conclusions led the IOC to impose lifetime bans for 43 athletes involved in doping at Sochi and strip Russia of 13 of 33 medals it won in 2014.Ahn, who gained Russian citizenship in 2011, was not suspected of doping during the Sochi Olympics, but Russian officials may have tampered with his testing samples and others from his short-track speed skating team.Ahn's fellow short-track skaters Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev were also not included in the list of potential Olympic participants from Russia.Ahn has not yet commented on the matter.This is copyrighted material owned by Digital Chosun Inc. No part of it may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.The exclusion is reportedly because his name was mentioned in the McLaren Report.The independent report was released by professor Richard McLaren of Western University in Canada, who was commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate allegations of state-sponsored doping in Russian sports.
According to the investigation, Russia gave banned drugs to athletes from 2011 to 2015 and tampered with or discarded more than 1,000 test samples. The conclusions led the IOC to impose lifetime bans for 43 athletes involved in doping at Sochi and strip Russia of 13 of 33 medals it won in 2014.Ahn, who gained Russian citizenship in 2011, was not suspected of doping during the Sochi Olympics, but Russian officials may have tampered with his testing samples and others from his short-track speed skating team.Ahn's fellow short-track skaters Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev were also not included in the list of potential Olympic participants from Russia.Ahn has not yet commented on the matter.This is copyrighted material owned by Digital Chosun Inc. No part of it may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.The exclusion is reportedly because his name was mentioned in the McLaren Report.The independent report was released by professor Richard McLaren of Western University in Canada, who was commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate allegations of state-sponsored doping in Russian sports.According to the investigation, Russia gave banned drugs to athletes from 2011 to 2015 and tampered with or discarded more than 1,000 test samples. The conclusions led the IOC to impose lifetime bans for 43 athletes involved in doping at Sochi and strip Russia of 13 of 33 medals it won in 2014.Ahn, who gained Russian citizenship in 2011, was not suspected of doping during the Sochi Olympics, but Russian officials may have tampered with his testing samples and others from his short-track speed skating team.Ahn's fellow short-track skaters Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev were also not included in the list of potential Olympic participants from Russia.Ahn has not yet commented on the matter. This is copyrighted material owned by Digital Chosun Inc. No part of it may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.Several of Russia's top medal hopes for next month's Olympics, including six-time short-track speedskating gold medalist Viktor Ahn, have been barred from the Pyeongchang Games amid the country's ongoing doping scandal.

Already depleted by doping bans and forced to compete under a neutral flag, Russia now faces an Olympics without some of its top skiers, figure skaters and sliders after they failed to pass International Olympic Committee vetting.Five hockey players have also been barred, including former NHL players Sergei Plotnikov, Valeri Nichushkin and Anton Belov.The exclusions stirred renewed talk of a boycott, though Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov said Tuesday the decision to compete by athletes and officials at a meeting last month remained in force.The chairman of the Russian parliament's sports committee, however, told The Associated Press that the country needed to "defend out honor.There was an attempt to take the Russian athletes' flag, anthem, to push Russia toward a boycott ... And now this is the second attempt, tyranny, an attempt to drive a wedge between athletes who had managed to keep their good name," Mikhail Degtyarev said. "I'm not personally a supporter of a boycott. I consider it counterproductive, but we need to defend our honor."The Russian Figure Skating Federation said the IOC was trying to provoke Russia into a boycott.The federation said it was "deeply disappointed in this baseless IOC decision which is reminiscent of a provocation with the aim of forcing Russian athletes by any means possible to decline to participate in the games."Besides Ahn, the Russian Olympic Committee said Tuesday that cross-country skier Sergei Ustyugov and biathlete Anton Shipulin had been left out of an IOC pool of eligible athletes. Other officials said five men's hockey players, two-time figure skating medalist Ksenia Stolbova and several other speedskaters were excluded.As punishment for what it termed a sophisticated doping program at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, the IOC has forced all Russians competing in Pyeongchang to do so as "Olympic Athletes from Russia" under the Olympic flag, rather than as an official Russian team.Russian athletes must be vetted by an IOC commission, which will examine their history of drug testing and links to past doping, before they are invited to the games.ROC senior vice president Stanislav Pozdnyakov said he had demanded an explanation from the IOC, adding that Ahn, Ustyugov and Shipulin "have never been involved in any doping cases and all of the many samples they have given during their careers testify that they are clean athletes. Regardless, their names are currently missing from the list of potential participants in the games.Pozdnyakov said he hopes the IOC decisions could be overturned.The Soviet Union boycotted the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics after the United States boycotted the Moscow Games four years earlier.The IOC said it would not comment on individual cases, and has not spelled out why any individual athletes were refused."By carefully looking at all the evidence available we wanted to be absolutely certain that there was not the slightest doubt or suspicion against any of those athletes who will be invited," said Valerie Fourneyron, who chairs the IOC panel which decides which Russians can compete.Not being included on the invitation list does not necessarily mean that an athlete has been doped - it should not automatically cast doubt on their integrity. The IOC would like to make clear that there may still be further enquires and further anti-doping procedures coming up against a number of those athletes who have not been included on the pool of athletes considered for invitation.Ahn won three gold medals for South Korea in short-track speedskating at the 2006 Olympics as Ahn Hyun-soo before switching allegiance to Russia in the run-up to the 2014 Sochi Olympics, where he won three more.The Russian Figure Skating Federation said in a statement that Stolbova, who won team gold and pairs silver in 2014, was excluded, as well as ice dancer Ivan Bukin, the son of 1988 Olympic gold medalist Andrei Bukin.The head of the Russian Skating Union, Alexei Kravtsov, told the RIA Novosti state news agency that numerous other speedskaters had been barred. They include world champions Pavel Kulizhnikov and Denis Yuskov, both of whom have previously served doping bans, as well as Ruslan Zakharov, who won an Olympic relay gold medal in short-track speedskating in Sochi in 2014.Russian news agencies reported the IOC still considers all members of the Russian Alpine skiing, freestyle skiing and curling teams to be eligible.On Friday, the IOC said it had cut an initial list of 500 Russian athletes down to a pool of 389, but didn't give any names. Russian officials have expressed hope they could field a team of 200 athletes. That's below the number that competed for Russia in 2014, but above its total from the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow is waiting for the IOC to clarify the situation."We have seen those deplorable reports in the media," Peskov said. "We deeply regret if such decisions have indeed been taken. But we hope the situation will clear up because we do have contacts with the IOC. We hope those contacts will help clarify the situation around the aforementioned prominent athletes.Associated Press reporters Nataliya Vasilyeva and Vladimir Kondrashov in Moscow, and AP Sports Writer Graham Dunbar in Geneva contributed to this report.Six-time Olympic short track speed skating champion, Russian national Viktor Ahn has been barred from the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea’s PyeongChang, a source familiar with the matter told TASS on Monday."Ahn has been barred from participation in the Olympic Games in PyeongChang. His teammates Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev have also been barred," the source said.

Viktor Ahn was born in South Korea’s Seoul as Ahn Hyun-Soo and initially competed for his native country’s team. At the 2006 Winter Olympics in Italy’s Turin he brought South Korea three golds and one bronze medal in short track.After the 2006 Olympics in Turin, a set of sustained injuries kept him sidelined from major short track competitions and before the 2010 Winter Olympics in Canada’s Vancouver he failed to qualify for the South Korean national team.In 2011 he was granted the Russian citizenship and announced his decision to speed skate for Russia at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, where he won three gold medals and one bronze medal.He is also the six-time Overall World Champion, winning the titles in 2003-2007 and in 2014.Grigoryev is a 2014 Sochi Olympic champion in a relay race and he also won five gold medals at European championships.Airapetyan participated in the 2018 European Short Track Speed Skating Championship where he won a silver medal in a relay race.Viktor Ahn has reportedly been ruled out of competing at the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics after being implicated in the McLaren Report, with fellow speed skaters on the Russian team also banned.Ahn is the world's most successful Olympic short track speed skater with six gold medals but will not take part in the South Korean Games in the country of his birth.Born in Seoul as Ahn Hyun-Soo, he won three golds and a bronze as part of the country's short track team at the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics.After these Games injuries kept him sidelined from major short track competitions and he failed to qualify for South Korea's team for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
In 2011 he was granted Russian citizenship and announced his decision to skate for his new country at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, where he won three gold medals and one bronze.Sports lawyer Mikhail Prokopets has reportedly confirmed Ahn will miss Pyeongchang 2018, asserting that it would be too late to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).Because of his controversial switch in nationalities, Ahn would have been a huge draw in Pyeongchang next month.It comes with the CAS today beginning hearings for the first group of 28 Russian athletes who are seeking to overturn life bans from the Olympic Games.This is unexpected information," Prokopets said, according to Sport-Express.We knew all the names of the suspended ones beforehand, Viktor Ahn was not on this list.CAS this week will consider the affairs of our Olympians, and Ahn will not have time to get into this trial, therefore, he will miss the Olympics."It has been claimed Ahn is one of 111 athletes excluded by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Commission Panel from a 500 athlete pool submitted by the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) for consideration for Pyeongchang 2018.Fellow short track speed skaters Denis Hayrapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev have also been excluded from the Games, according to reports in Russia.The latter was a Sochi 2014 gold medallist in the team relay competition, while he is also a five-time European champion.Turin 2006 speed skating gold medallist Svetlana Zhurova, who is now deputy of the Russian State Duma, claimed the decision to exclude Ahn is political.I do not understand how you can hold the Olympics without the God of the short track," she said to Sport-Express.Especially [as] the competitions take place in his homeland.There is no doubt that Viktor Ahn is the god of short track.And the IOC has just stripped the competition of the main character.Maybe it is blasphemy on my part to say so, but it's absolutely true.I do not understand how God can be prevented before the Olympics, when he fulfilled all the standards.It is possible further athletes could be removed should they not meet "pre-conditions such as further pre-Games tests and reanalysis from stored samples".It is likely, though, that most of the 389 remaining individuals will be permitted to be considered for selection by the ROC.This means it appears very likely that the eventual team, competing under the "neutral" Olympic Athlete of Russia banner, will be around 200.That is only slightly less than the 214 who competed at Sochi 2014, where Russia benefited from host nation positions.A 151-strong team participated at Salt Lake City 2002, 174 at Turin 2006 and 175 at Vancouver 2010.If Russia is able to fulfil all of the quota places it currently has, they would have 213 positions.A total of 39 athletes are hoping to overturn life bans at CAS, with the hearings taking place in Geneva.They have all been sanctioned by the IOC for their alleged involvement in doping and sample tampering at their home Sochi 2014 Games.A decision is expected to be announced between January 29 and February 2.Cases involving biathletes Olga Zaytseva, Olga Vilukhina and Yana Romanova have been "suspended".Both Grigory Rodchenkov, the former Moscow Laboratory director and the main witness in allegations against the athletes, and Richard McLaren, head of a World Anti-Doping Agency-commissioned investigation and the author of the McLaren Report, are expected to testify via video or telephone link.Bobsleigh's Maxim Belugin is the one Russian athlete not to have appealed following his disqualification.He is believed to have produced a positive test result following reanalysis of his samples.The International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation have confirmed that, unlike the other Russian sliders implicated, he is currently suspended from competition.All of the Russians involved in the CAS cases were sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee for their alleged involvement in doping and sample tampering at their home Games.South Korea is preparing to host its first Winter Olympics when the 2018 edition gets underway in Pyeongchang in February.

The Games will be made up of 15 sports: 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. Curling and ski jumping get going before the opening ceremony in Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium on 9 February. The Games wrap up on 25 February with the women's curling gold medal match and the men's ice hockey gold medal match.North Korea will send 22 athletes to next month's Winter Games in the South, the International Olympic Committee said Saturday, approving a landmark deal between two nations still officially at war. South Korea had hoped that the Games which begin in Pyeongchang on Feb. 9 could help ease the crisis on the peninsula plagued by months of rising tensions over the North's nuclear and missile and program.In a surprise New Year's announcement, the leader of Stalinist North Korea Kim Jong-un said he was open to sending a delegation to Pyeongchang. Before this week's meeting at IOC headquarters in Lausanne, the two Koreas had already agreed on a set of momentous compromises, including delegations from both countries marching together at the opening ceremony and the formation of a unified women's hockey team. But the two Koreas still needed approval from the IOC, as the pact required the suspension of some basic Olympic rules. IOC president Thomas Bach gave that approval Saturday, announcing that 22 athletes had been cleared to compete in three sports and a total of five disciplines. Those include figure skating, short-track speed skating, cross-country skiing and Alpine skiing, as well as hockey, with the IOC having approved the entry of the joint team, despite concerns voiced by some hockey federations over fairness.   At the opening ceremony, the joint delegation "will be led into the Olympic stadium by the Korean unification flag" carried together by athlete from each country, the IOC said. A special unity uniform will be created for the event.No North Korean athlete had technically qualified for Pyeongchang, so Saturday's announcement required extending qualification deadlines in the sports concerned.Today marks a milestone on a long journey," Bach said after the closed-door meeting with the leaders of the Olympic committees from both Koreas as well Pyeongchang 2018 organisers, and senior government officials from the two countries.The Olympic Winter Games in Pyeongchang are hopefully opening the door to a brighter future on the Korean peninsula, and inviting the world to join in a celebration of hope," Bach said. North Korea has taken part in seven of the last 12 Winter Olympics, most recently in Vancouver 2010.But its presence in Pyeongchang -- just 80 kilometres south of the demilitarized zone that divides the Koreas -- is a significant diplomatic coup.  North and South Korea remain technically at war since the Korean war ended with armistice, not a peace treaty, in 1953. North Korea will also send 24 officials and 21 media representatives to Pyeongchang, Bach said.  Seoul and the IOC will have to ensure that while accommodating the North and ensuring that the so-called "peace Olympics" pass off smoothly, they do not violate United Nations sanctions. Security Council measures currently prohibit cash transfers to the North, while the UN has also drawn up a blacklist of officials tied to the Stalinist Pyongyang regime, individuals whose presence at the Games will create potential stumbling blocks. (AFP) LAUSANNE, Switzerland, Jan. 20 (Yonhap) -- North Korea will send 22 athletes to compete in three sports at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games in South Korea, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said Saturday.IOC President Thomas Bach made the announcement here after chairing a four-party meeting with representatives from the PyeongChang Olympic Organizing Committee and the respective national Olympic bodies of the two Koreas. IOC members from the two countries, Ryu Seung-min from the South and Chang Ung from the North, were also on hand.Bach said that, in addition to those athletes in three sports and five disciplines -- women's hockey, figure skating, short track speed skating, cross-country skiing and alpine skiing -- North Korea will also send 24 officials, including coaches.The Koreas agreed Wednesday on the North's participation in the first Winter Olympics to be held in the South and also on a joint women's hockey team. It was up to the IOC to finalize the details, including protocols regarding the North's uniform, anthem and flag, and the size of the North's athletic delegation.Bach said the IOC made "exceptional decisions" to ensure the participation of North Korean athletes since none qualified for the competition.The Koreas will have a unified women's hockey team competing under the Korean Unification Flag -- an image of the Korean Peninsula in blue against a white background -- and their anthem will be the Korean folk song "Arirang." The team will use the acronym COR and will be the first joint Korean sports team at an Olympic Games.

South Korea named 23 players on Thursday, and North Korea will add 12 players. Game rosters are set at 22, with 20 skaters and two goalies, and the head coach Sarah Murray will have to pick at least three North Koreans for each match.In other sports, the Koreas will compete in their respective uniforms. The pairs team of Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik will represent the North. They actually qualified for PyeongChang last fall but missed an Oct. 30 deadline to confirm their participation.In short track speed skating, Jong Kwang-bom in the men's 1,500 meters and Choe Un-song in the men's 500 meters will represent North Korea.Han Chun-gyong, Pak Il-chol and Ri Yong-gum will compete for the North in cross-country skiing, and Choe Myong-gwang, Kang Song-il and Kim Ryon-hyang will compete in alpine skiing.The IOC said it will provide any necessary technical equipment in cooperation with those sports' international federations."The Olympic Games are always about building bridges; they never erect walls," Bach said. "The Olympic spirit is about respect, dialogue and understanding. The Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 are hopefully opening the door for a brighter future on the Korean Peninsula and inviting the world to join in the celebration of hope.The 23rd Winter Olympics get under way in Pyeongchang, South Korea, on 9 February and BBC Sport will deliver comprehensive digital coverage.There will be network TV coverage around the clock from live action to highlights programmes brought to you by presenters Clare Balding, Hazel Irvine, Eilidh Barbour and Radzi Chinyanganya.There will be live action on the BBC Sport website and app, catch-up video highlights and on-demand clips, analysis, insight and news from the Games to audiences wherever they are, on whichever device they want, across all 17 days of action as well as on social media.Great Britain are aiming for their most successful Winter Olympics in history after UK Sport set a target of at least five medals from the Pyeongchang Games.The current record is a four-medal haul set in 1924 and 2014, although Team GB could yet earn a fifth medal from Sochi after three Russian bobsleighers were banned for doping.Russia’s Viktor Ahn, the most decorated Olympic short track speed skater, has been barred from competing at next month’s Pyeongchang Winter Games in his native South Korea, the TASS news agency has reported. Born Ahn Hyun-soo in Seoul, the skater won three gold medals and a bronze at the 2006 Turin Games for South Korea but was passed over for Vancouver four years later due to a knee injury and after falling out with Korea’s skating union.Ahn then gave up his South Korean passport and switched allegiance to Russia in 2011 and returned to Olympic ice with a vengeance in Sochi in 2014, winning three more golds and a bronze.“Ahn has been barred from participation in the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang,” TASS quoted a source familiar with the matter as saying late on Monday. “His team mates Denis Airapetyan and Vladimir Grigoryev have also been barred.The report did not provide any reason for Ahn’s exclusion from the Games.The participation of Russian athletes at the 2018 Games has been under a cloud after widespread doping at the Sochi Winter Games was exposed by an independent report for the World Anti-Doping Agency.The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has banned Russia from the Feb. 9-25 Pyeongchang Games as a result of its “unprecedented systematic manipulation” of the anti-doping system.It left the door open for Russian athletes with a clean doping history to be invited to compete as neutrals under an Olympic flag, however.On Friday, the IOC said it had reduced the pool of Russian athletes eligible to compete at next month’s Pyeongchang winter Olympics to 389 from 500. The sun hadn’t fully poked over the Wasatch mountains when Maame Biney came bounding through the lobby of the Utah Olympic Oval, her braids bobbing and a smile enveloping most of her youthful face.Others were still wiping the sleep from their eyes, as the young speedskater went through her morning routine: exercise bike, stretching, jogging, talking Kardashians, calculating the days until her 18th birthday.This is the last semester of Biney’s senior year of high school, but there was no schoolwork on tap. Instead, she’d spend the day like she does most others: training for the upcoming Winter Olympics some 2,000 miles away from her home in northern Virginia, where her dad and classmates live, and some 7,000 miles away from where she was born in Accra, Ghana, where her mother and brother still reside.Maame (pronounced Mah-MAY) Biney, 17, is the first African-American woman to qualify for an American Olympic speedskating team, and at the PyeongChang Games she promises to be one of the most improbable, unforgettable and charismatic members of the U.S. Olympic team. Her journey to the Winter Games is like few others. Her father often jokes that in Ghana, ice is used solely to keep beer cold, so his daughter’s chosen pursuit might draw some confused looks back in the country of her birth. Even in the United States, short-track speedskating is a niche sport that pokes its head into the mainstream every four years.But when the PyeongChang Games begin next month in South Korea, the spotlight will find Biney. NBC will make her a focal point in the Olympics’ opening week, certain her story will connect with American viewers: the youngest woman on the U.S. short-track team, a possible medal contender who can connect with youth, with African Americans, with sports fans and, well, with everyone really.It hasn’t set in yet,” Biney says, “and I don’t think it’ll set in until I’m, like, there or until the Games are done. Things that are this big, it takes me awhile because I just can’t believe it. It’s crazy — I’m going to the Olympics!”She broke into a fit of laughter, which would surprise no one. For Biney, a smile is her default, and she became a breakout star of sorts at the U.S. Olympic trials last month when she giggled uncontrollably through a nationally televised interview.“I’ve actually never seen Maame in a bad mood,” said Anthony Barthell, the U.S. short-track coach.At a recent practice, Barthell and Biney exchanged banter between training laps, and the coach likened her to Princess Fiona from the animated film “Shrek.Fiona was a princess, and she was a beast,” he joked.

Soon, the coach was holding his stopwatch, and Biney and her U.S. teammates were zipping around the track at speeds topping 30 mph. It all quickly became a blur — the lightning-fast racers, sure, but also Biney’s bright future and her atypical past, her close-knit bond with her father and of course her talent and practically unmatched potential.Kweku Biney grew up a world far removed from ice rinks and winter sports or even winter. In Accra, he played soccer barefoot, kicking around an orange, perhaps, or a sock that’d been stuffed. He didn’t have a television and learned about the Western world from newspapers and magazines.He says he left Ghana nearly 35 years ago. He didn’t have much money and says he crossed the Sahara desert by hitchhiking and walking, a six-month journey that eventually brought him to Europe.“I was just fearless,” Kweku says today. “I could go anywhere by myself. I wasn’t afraid of anything.”He always knew his final destination, and when he’d saved enough, Kweku boarded his first airplane, bound for the United States. He settled in Maryland around 1985 and says he married Biney’s mother in the United States, but she later returned to Ghana, where Biney was born in 2000.When she was 5 years old, Kweku invited his daughter to visit him in the United States. Less than two miles from getting picked up at Dulles International Airport, a young Biney burst into tears, begging her father to take her back. He pulled over to console her, but a few miles later, she was crying again. She was still in tears when they arrived in Wheaton, Maryland, where Kweku lived at the time. The two didn’t even get out of the car.We went straight into J.C. Penney,” he recalled. “As soon as we got in that store, she saw the big store, she started running around, from aisle to aisle. She says, ‘Daddy, I like this one. No, no, no — I don’t like that one, I like this one!’There was nothing like the giant department store back in Accra, and by Day 2 in the United States, Biney insisted she wouldn’t return to Ghana. Weighing the opportunities and educational benefits, Kweku said, his family made the difficult decision to let her remain in the United States.Biney’s mother, Gina, who runs a salon in Ghana, could not be reached, and Kweku offers few details on the family split beyond that it wasn’t always easy. Biney has few memories of her childhood in Ghana and says she often misses not having her mother nearby.It was really hard,” she said, “and it is still kind of hard to deal with the fact that my mother’s not here to support or experience this with my dad and I. … I’m a girl, and my dad’s a guy. He doesn’t really get some of the things that I go through, and I can’t really talk to him about certain things because it’s awkward.”But those who’ve watched Biney grow and mature, both on the ice and off, say that she and her father share a special bond. And he essentially launched an Olympic career, even if he had no idea he was doing so, when a dozen years ago, he pointed out a sign on the side of the road.We were driving down this street right here — Sunset Hills Road,” Kewku, 58, said one recent afternoon, chatting not far from his home in Reston, Virginia, and excitedly poking a finger in the air. “I think it was one day after work. I saw the sign in front of the rink. It said, ‘Learn to skate.’ I asked her, ‘Maame, you want to try this?’ Biney had been in the United States for less than a year and had no idea what ice skating was, but she eagerly agreed. A week or two later, her father dropped her off at SkateQuest ice rink for her first figure skating class.The very first day she got on the ice, I was like, ‘Ooh, what did I get myself into?’ ” Kweku recalled. “I thought this girl was going to fall down, break open her head and blood all over the place. But you know, that didn’t happen.Though Biney took to the ice right away, she wasn’t a perfect fit for the beginners’ class. An instructor explained to Kweku that his daughter was moving too fast for figure skating and suggested they seek out a speedskating class instead. They were directed toward DC-ICE, a nonprofit aimed at introducing the sport to inner city youth that met every Saturday morning in Washington.For the Bineys, that meant setting an alarm for 5 a.m. and making the 27-mile trek to Fort Dupont Ice Arena before sunrise.Those early classes were run by Nathaniel Mills, a three-time Olympian who was immediately struck by Biney’s big personality, if not her palpable athletic potential. She was still learning to maintain her balance and was a tad clumsy on the ice. But she showed up every Saturday morning, wearing bright colors and a brighter smile.She’s very much an original. She’s her own person, for sure,” Mills said. “That was apparent at a very early age.”Her talent and potential didn’t emerge until she threw herself deeper into the sport, moving to a club in Rockville, Maryland and spending more time each week on the ice. She started refining her technique and participating in local and regional competitions.Kweku works in maintenance for a company near their Reston home. He racked up thousands of miles on his odometer and thousands of dollars in bills for coaching and ice time. But he never missed practices, often showing up early to help prep the rink and staying late to pepper the coaches with questions.

“For me, it was very, very hard. It was a long journey,” he said. “I had to sacrifice so many things. The most important thing was always my pocketbook. … But to me, it wasn’t a problem. I’m not too concerned about that. If I have it, I just spend it on her.”Biney has come to understand only recently what it meant for father to build so much of their life around her speedskating: their weekends, their family budget, their future.I’m like, ‘Holy cow, I have taken my dad for granted for at least five years. I need to not do that,’ ” she said. “Why? Why would he spend so much money on a sport where you don’t know what’s going to happen? You can break an ankle in a moment’s notice, or you could not make the team. Why would my dad spend all that money for this moment?The answer is twofold: Kweku says he saw the joy that speedskating brought his daughter, and as she grew in the sport, he began to understand her potential. Racing for the Dominion Speedskating Club, she began to raise her profile. Last year, she won bronze at the junior world championships, and the Olympics suddenly seemed possible.In speedskating, elite athletes spend six or seven days a week on the ice. Many travel to South Korea for training. Biney was still a full-time high school student, and the family knew she needed more ice time to make the PyeongChang Games.Following her junior year at South Lakes High in Reston, she and her father met with officials from Fairfax County Public Schools to explore their options. Biney was hoping to relocate to Kearns, a small community about 10 miles southwest of Salt Lake City where the U.S. national team trains. She was excited to learn she could take her final year of classes online and move to Utah full time. But for a girl who had never been to a sleepover party, that meant leaving her father.I didn’t know how I was going to feel letting her go,” Kweku said. In those first few days apart, he recalls hearing some noise and yelling into an empty house, “Maame, what are you doing?”I forgot she was gone,” he said.Biney has been living with a host family the past seven months in Park City. She calls her father daily, and during practices she’ll often search the empty bleachers for her father’s attentive gaze.But he’s never there, unfortunately,” she said.Since she got her first taste of it as a shaky 5-year-old wobbling on skates, Biney has never quite gotten over the speed. The sensation she feels flying around the oval is unlike anything else.The wind in my face, breezing past me. Oh, man, it feels amazing. … It’s like when it’s a hot day outside and you just get the cold breeze on your face, it feels like that,” she said, “but 100 times better because you’re skating.She’s explosive off the starting line and can accelerate as quickly as some of the fastest men. She’ll compete in the 500- and the 1,500-meter races in PyeongChang — with her father looking on from the stands — but knows her best bet will be at the shorter distance. At the U.S. trials, she nearly swept the 500-meter races and posted a personal-best time of 43.161 seconds.Coaches are excited by the potential that lies beyond these Olympics. Biney just recently started doing weight training, and her technique has a lot of room for growth. In some ways, these Olympics are her ground floor. Her athletic peak might be four, or even eight, years away.If she has a secret weapon, it’s the exuberance she brings to the ice. As she puts it, “having a day without laughter is not a good day.That’s obviously something you can’t coach or teach or instill,” said Mills, her youth coach. “That reservoir of joy she has is absolutely the thing that’s allowed her to get as far as she’s gotten with all the demands of the sport. And I think it’s the thing that will support her becoming one of the best short-track speedskaters that’s ever come out of the United States, as long as she can stay healthy.Biney doesn’t yet have a cellphone or a driver’s license. She turns 18 in a week and is applying to colleges. She’d love to attend school next fall somewhere nearby that would allow her to continue training full time with the national team.She doesn’t necessarily crave the attention the Olympics might bring but likes the idea that she might be an inspirational figure, perhaps to young black girls or to a nation of dreamers halfway around the world.She says she talks to her family in Ghana once a week or so, but she hasn’t been back to visit since 2014. Almost all of her childhood memories are from her time in the United States, but she feels connected to both countries.I was born in Ghana, so I am Ghanaian,” she said. “But I identify myself as American, because I’m here to represent America and do great things for America.”

As the Olympics draw closer, the daily practices have become more intense. The skaters’ legs burn after several laps around the oval, and the entire group is constantly teetering between tears and laughter, buoyed by jokes and teasing.Seven laps, Maame!” Barthell barked late in a recent practice, challenging her to keep pace with some of her male teammates. “And if you get dropped, guess what? You’ve got to do them by yourself next time.Biney couldn’t help herself. She burst into laughter. It’s that carefree attitude that carried her to the Winter Games, that has her positioned for the spotlight and perhaps a medal podium.I just hope to have fun and not overstress about my results or how I’m going to do or what everyone’s going to think,” she said. “I tend to do that, and it’s not good. I just hope to have fun and enjoy my Olympic experience.”The 2018 Winter Olympics are upon us, which means if you haven't already, it's now time to start counting up your sick days, scouring official schedules and figuring out which days you'll be calling out of work. Or, if you don't have any sick days left because flu season kicked your butt, you'll need to start figuring out how to watch all the figure skating and curling you want from your desk while fooling your boss into thinking you're actually working. Not that we would know much about that.Here's everything you need to know to prepare yourselves for one of the greatest traditions in human history. The 2018 Winter Olympics will be held in PyeongChang, South KoreaThis is the first time in 30 years that Korea has hosted the Olympics; Seoul hosted the Summer Games in 1988. While this is a fun fact that you can and definitely should bust out at viewing parties, it's also important to know this because it obviously involves a major time difference. South Korea is 14 hours ahead of New York and the rest of the Eastern timezone, meaning it is 17 hours ahead Los Angeles. If you want to watch events as they unfold in real time, you will need to plan ahead. The Olympics will consume your life from Thursday, Feb. 8 until Sunday, Feb. 25.Competition actually begins Thursday, Feb. 8 -- curling and ski jumping kick off the festivities -- but the opening ceremonies will take place the next day, Friday, Feb. 9. Events will continue until the closing ceremonies on Sunday, Feb. 25.The games will be broadcast on NBC, but you can also livestream eventsNBC will broadcast the Games across all NBC Universal platforms (including NBCSN, USA, and The Olympic Channel) starting with the opening ceremony Friday, Feb. 9 at 8/7c. Of course, the events will be tape-delayed because of the aforementioned time difference, so you would be wise to check out NBC's schedule to find out what will be airing and when. If you, like Paula Cole, don't want to wait, NBC will also host a livestream of their coverage of the games on its website as well as on the NBC Sports app.4. There are just 15 sports in the Winter OlympicsWhile the Summer Games seem to have 100 different sports, the Winter Olympics have 15. On the slopes you'll find alpine skiing, biathlon, cross-country skiing, freestyle skiing, nordic combined, ski jumping, and snowboarding. Over on the ice, you'll see curling, figure skating, ice hockey, short track speed skating, and speed skating. And last but not least, there are the sliding sports bobsleigh, luge and skeleton.There are four events making their Olympics debut in PyeongChangWho doesn't love new stuff? This winter you'll see big air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling, mass start speed skating and mixed team alpine skiing join the competition.You should probably familiarize yourself with these folks:Skier Mikaela Shiffrin, who took home the top prize in Sochi at 18 to become the youngest Olympic slalom gold medalist, has been called the "the best slalom skier in the world." In PyeongChang, she'll be attempting to become the first person of any gender to repeat as Olympic slalom champion. Meanwhile, Gus Kenworthy, who took home the silver in the inaugural men's ski slopestyle event at Sochi, is also returning. He made waves in 2015 when he became the first action-sports (vs. mainstream sports) star to come out as gay.Elsewhere, snowboarder Chloe Kim, 17, is poised to become a new Team USA favorite in her first Olympics. She actually qualified in 2014, but she could not compete because of her age. She is the heavy favorite to take home the gold in the halfpipe. Meanwhile, two-time gold medalist Shaun White, who finished fourth in the halfpipe in 2014, will attempt a shot at redemption after qualifying for the U.S. Olympic team earlier this month. He is coming back from a serious injury he sustained in October.On the ice, watch out for rising star Nathan Chen, 18, the first male figure skater to land five quadruple jumps in a single performance. On the women's side, Mirai Nagasu, who placed fourth at the 2010 Olympics but failed to make the team in 2014, will be going for the gold in PyeongChang.And last but not least, Pita Taufatofua, better known as Tonga's sexy, oiled-up flag bearer at the Rio Games, will be competing as a cross-country skier. This just feels like something you should know.7. There are 102 medals up for grabs this yearIf you're reading this, it probably means you don't stand a chance in winning a medal at the Olympics, which is a shame, because the PyeongChang medals are rather striking, especially compared to those from years past.Bob Costas won't be hosting the Olympics this yearIt was announced in 2017 that Bob Costas, who has handled hosting duties for NBC's Olympics coverage since 1992, is stepping down from the role to make way for sportscaster Mike Tirico, who joined NBC from ESPN, where he was the play-by-play announcer for Monday Night Football. Who will we be without Bob Costas? We'll soon find out.


Please don't pretend like this isn't something you were dying to know. Lipinski and Weir will be back as NBC's primetime figure skating announcers. It should go without saying they will once again probably be delightful.The National Hockey League announced in 2017 that it will not allow players to participate in the 2018 Olympics, ending five consecutive Winter Olympics involving NHL players. The league did not want to include a 17-day break in the middle of the hockey season to allow for players to participate in the Winter Games, which will likely hurt both the U.S. and Canadian teams' chances of taking home the gold.In December, the International Olympic Committee announced it was barring Russia's national Olympic committee from the 2018 Games as punishment for its alleged state-sponsored cover-up of athlete doping. However, select athletes will be able to compete under a neutral Olympic flag.Soohorang is very cute. "Sooho" comes from the Korean word for protection, while "rang" comes from the middle letter of ""Ho-rang-i," the word for "tiger." It is also the last letter of "Jeong-seon A-ri-rang," which is a traditional folk song from the Gangwon Province, which is where the Games will be held. You're going to be full of fun facts this winter!After her infectiously giddy interviews and her viral celebration (and accidental pratfall) upon qualifying for the Winter Olympics last month, 17-year-old Maame Biney (pronounced MAH-may BYE-nee) has quickly become America's most charming speedskater since a certain soul-patched glider stormed his way to gold in Salt Lake City 16 years ago. Now Biney hopes to follow in Apolo Ohno's path, to gold in PyeongChang, where the 2017 world junior bronze medalist in the 500 meters will become just the second African-born Winter Olympian to represent Team USA. (A native of Ghana, Biney immigrated to Rockville, Md., when she was five.) SI caught up with the teen phenom about her newfound fame, being a role model and the virtues of failing—and falling. A lot of people really enjoyed your reaction immediately after you qualified for the Olympics by winning the 500-meter races at trials. What was that moment like for you?When I crossed the line, I didn't realize that I made the team. I just was like, "Oh, yeah, I won! I'm one step closer to making the team." And then when I high-fived Anthony [Barthell, the short-track national team coach], I found out, "Oh! I made the team!" And I started cheering more and more. And then I fell down.Had you thought a lot before about how you would react?I didn't think about what my reaction would be if I made the team, because I knew it would be really hard. I was skating against three Olympians, and we only had three spots, so I was telling myself that it would be fine if I didn't make the team. But when I did ... I don't know ... it was a lot of emotions. What has life been like for you since qualifying?Oh, wow. It's been a lot crazier than I thought it would be. A lot of people wanted to talk to me. All of a sudden my Instagram and Twitter were blowing up. It's very overwhelming, and I'm still getting used to it.What are you most looking forward to about the whole Olympic experience?The opening ceremony. For the 2016 Olympics, I watched it and had chills going up my arms because I was like, "I want to be there someday." And I'm going, which is awesome. It's gotten some attention that you're the first African-American woman to qualify for the Olympics in speedskating. What does that mean to you?It means a lot to me, and it's such an honor for people to look up to me and want me as their role model. I don't think of myself as a role model because I'm 17 years old and still a kid. But that's amazing, and I hope to inspire everyone to go for it. Who are some of the athletes that you look up to? One of them would be [two-time Olympic gold medalist speedskater] Shani Davis. And Gabby Douglas, Simone Biles and Serena Williams. They're so powerful in everything they do. They get through the hard things, and they're just amazing. I strive to be like them one day.Have you gotten a chance to meet or talk to any of them? I've known Shani forever. Last year I had the chance to talk to Simone Biles over the phone, and she gave me a lot of advice on how to get through things like this—media, friends and how to balance everything. It was really awesome to get to talk to her.And what would you say to the people who are now going to look up to you? Have fun. Having fun is the best thing you can do. Also, don't be afraid to fail. If you fail, get back up because that's how you learn, and learning is awesome.Picking up medals on the fast ice of the Gangneung Oval at the Winter Olympics could be a tall order for South Korea’s speed skaters, according to Dutchman Bob de Jong, who is assistant coach of the hosts’ national team. A long-distance specialist with four Olympic medals including gold in the 10,000m in Turin in 2006, De Jong arrived in the country last May to help train their skaters.The Koreans are better known for their prowess in short track, but the Dutchman is bringing his vast experience to bear on honing their technique over the longer distances.South Korea sprang a surprise when they won five medals on the long track in Vancouver, with the country finishing with 14 medals in total in 2010, their best haul at a Winter Games.The hosts are targeting a total of 20 medals at next month’s Games, but De Jong is just focusing on getting the best out of his skaters.”They’ve got a longer short track history,“ he told Reuters from Seoul. ”Four years ago (in Sochi) they got two medals (on the long track) so it was not that good, and even in the coming Olympics it’ll be really hard to get medals.
I know the international level, it’s higher. I don’t want to talk about a target of how many medals we can take. First focus on good skating, even I did that in my own career.Most of the skaters De Jong is working with have converted from short track and the seven-times world champion explained how they have had to unlearn years of training in a different technique to prepare for the longer runs.”I‘m not a transfer coach. They’re already long track skaters,“ he said. ”But you can see on the long track they have the background of short track skaters.The most important part is using your bodyweight in the straights and that’s kind of new for the short track skaters because they are not (used to) skating straights.” In the short track, the corners are four steps and you really slow down in rhythm, but for long track you need a higher rhythm,” he said.They’re so comfortable with the low rhythm in the corners, but if you do that in the long track, your legs will be blowing up.”

De Jong said Olympic records could fall in Gangneung and is pushing his skaters to get as close to those times as possible to give them their best shot at a medal.A couple of skaters, they are really close (to the Olympic records),” he said. “Lee Seung-hoon is absolutely one of the biggest skaters here in Korea and he’s in good shape to make a good performance.Lee, who took gold in the 10,000m at the Vancouver Games ahead of Ivan Skobrev and De Jong himself, could race in the mass start, 1,500m, 5,000m, 10,000m, and team pursuit.“The team pursuit with the three skaters are getting really good times,” De Jong said. “One of the men’s teams was really close to breaking the world record this year already.”Lee Sang-Hwa and Kim Min-sun are carrying the country’s medal hopes in the women’s 500m, while Kim Bo-reum could challenge in the mass start and 1,500m.Language is biggest barrier De Jong has faced in South Korea and while he is loving his time in the country, the 41-year-old is also having to adapt to the culture.”For me the language is really hard,“ he said. ”I’ve got my translator in the team, the video analyst is also translating a lot of things for me, but the biggest thing is body language.”I think to explain the technique it’s quite easy to do it by body language.”It’s such a big difference in culture. In Korea they have a lot of respect. Sometimes the skaters have to tell me more information about how they feel, what they think about the training, but in their culture it’s not normal to tell.“It’s not about good or bad. It’s a culture thing. I don’t want to change it and I can‘t. It’s impossible to change a culture.” The British team have been set a record target of five medals at next month’s Winter Olympics.It’s less than a month until the British team head to the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea and it’s been predicted that the squad will take home plenty of bling after UK Sport invested over £32m.Lizzy Yarnold will be the first British athlete attempting to defend a Winter gold when she aims to reclaim the Skeleton title she won at the 2014 games in Sochi.  Meanwhile the curling teams, Team Smith and Team Muirhead, are predicted to take home a minimum of one medal.Russia will not be competing in this year’s games after it was found to have been running a state-sponsored doping scheme, which led to the country being stripped of 51 Olympic medals they won between 2011 and 2015. Athletes, who were cleared of doping and are participating in the games, are competing as Olympic Athletes from Russia.Meanwhile, for the first time since 1998, National Hockey League stars will not be participating in the Winter Olympics. The NHL opted against giving its players a break to compete in PyeongChang.The 2018 Winter Olympics will feature 102 events in 15 sports. The four new disciplines added this year include big air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling, mass start speed skating and mixed team alpine skiing. Here’s everything you need to know ahead of the games…The 2018 Winter Games will start on Thursday, February 8 and run until Sunday, February 25, with games commencing at 9am local time, while the opening ceremony is kicking off on Friday, February 9 at 8pm local time. The games will take place at Alpensia ski resort, in PyeongChang, South Korea.How can I watch it?The Winter Olympics 2018 will be broadcasted on Eurosport after the Discovery-owned network won the rights to show Olympics across Europe from 2018 (and the UK from 2022).Who is competing?Skeleton champion Lizzy Yarnold is the first British athlete to defend an Olympic title after she won gold at the 2014 games in Sochi. Short track speed skater Elise Christie became triple world champion at the 2017 World Championships and will be competing in three events in Pyeongchang.The curling teams have won four medals at the games, including bronze and silver in Sochi four years ago. Team Smith and Team Muirhead are predicted to take home a minimum of one medal.Snowboarder Katie Omerod won her first World Cup gold in Big Air last season and the event makes its Olympic debut in Pyeongchang. The Games will be South Korea’s second Olympic Games and its first Winter Games. Seoul hosted the summer games in 1988.

Winter Olympic 2018 News,Score

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