Your favorite moments at the Winter Olympic Games Milano Cortina 2026

[clemsonbeav 438]

NBC had a lovely special after the ceremony...even highlighted some non-USA athletes.  Perhaps a few Americans will know Klaebo's name now!  There was even a segment highlighting the Italian medallists, that this was a record year for them, too.   (Best of Milan Cortina, on Peacock, if you can access it.)

[bmo 230]

From a  perspective:

 

Elana Meyers Taylor winning monobob, Alysa Liu winning women's figure skating, Shiffrin winning women's slalom & both our hockey teams winning gold

 

From an international perspective:

 

 Klaebo dominating cross country skiing events

 Shaidorov winning men's figure skating

 Franjo von Allmen dominating men's alpine skiing

 Kingsbury winning gold in dual moguls

 Netherlands dominating short track now??!?!?!

 Lucas winning gold for Brasil and South America

 

In reality, all the athletes are winners for sacrificing so much to participate in these Olympics. What an incredible games full of unpredictable and inspiring moments!

[Topicmaster1010 6,351]

Now that I've had half a day to recover from the traumatic hockey loss, I can answer this question better:

 

Favourite Moments from Canadian Athletes (not many but they still exist)

• The Cross-Country skiing team delivering great performance after great performance and giving hope for a Canadian renaissance in the sport
• Rachel Homan finally overcoming her Olympic demons and winning a medal in curling
• Mikael Kingsbury winning the first dual moguls Olympic gold medal at capping his career with an Olympic gold
• Megan Oldham winning gold in freeski big air
• Seeing the emergence of Stephen Gogolev in men's figure skating
• Deanna Stellato-Dudek finally getting to live out her Olympic dream at 42 years old when it looked like it wouldn't be the case after an injury in a practice session
• Piper Gilles/Paul Poirier finally getting an Olympic medal in Ice Dance
• Courtney Sarault winning 4 medals after winning no medals in 2022 and almost quitting the sport in 2023
• Laurent Dubreuil finally winning a medal in the 500m
• Valerie Maltais (at 35 years old) turning back the clock and having a career year winning 3 Olympic medals in speed skating
• Women's Team Pursuit winning back-to-back gold medals

 

Favourite Moments from International Athletes:

•  Lucas Pinheiro Braathen winning gold in the men's giant slalom
•  Johan-Olav Botn dedicating his win to Sivert Guttorm Bakken
•  Federica Brignone overcoming injury and winning 2 gold medals
•  Lisa Vittozzi winning biathlon gold on home soil
•  Seeing the incredible Bulgarian performances in biathlon
•  Elana Meyers Taylor finally winning Olympic gold
•  Klaebo dominance
• Nazgul the dog
•  Mikhail Shaidorov winning gold in men's figure skating
•  Alysa Liu winning gold after retiring from the sport in 2022
• Men's Freeski big air final
• Seeing the emergence of  Kacper Tomasiak in ski jumping
• The parallel giant slalom events
•  Choi Ga-on winning halfpipe gold after a scary injury on her 1st run
• Even though it wasn't the result I wanted, the men's snowboard cross final had a thrilling finish
•  Francesca Lollobrigida stunning everyone with gold in the women's 3000m and 5000m
• In general, seeing all the countries that hadn't won a Winter Olympic medal ever or in a long time win a medal at these Games

[Federer91 3,372]

The best part of last nights closing ceremony was the highlight montage Eurosport made.

 

Anyone who didn't see it NEEDS to see it. Amazing.   Probably my second favourite montage of an OG after the London one in 2012.

 

 

Edited Monday at 09:03 PM by Federer91

[FancyFenchel 121]

1 hour ago, Federer91 said:

The best part of last nights closing ceremony was the highlight montage Eurosport made.

 

Anyone who didn't see it NEEDS to see it. Amazing.   Probably my second favourite montage of an OG after the London one in 2012.

 

 

02:33 @brunamoura @heywoodu

[Roamingrover86 957]

There were lots of good moments , this olympics felt so special (I am talking of WOG). The last time I really enjoyed viewing WOG was in Sochi & this tops it. So many feel good moments, very well attended event with spectators filling up stands & making an atmosphere. So many top performances, but for me the  women team dominating the Biathlon event was really special. All 3 of them were just so good & gave top performance. I love it how the female commentator pronounced  Lou Jeanmonnot  & finally grazie mille  we loved it! Thanks for making me fall in love with winter sports again 

[bmo 230]

40 minutes ago, Roamingrover86 said:

There were lots of good moments , this olympics felt so special (I am talking of WOG). The last time I really enjoyed viewing WOG was in Sochi & this tops it. So many feel good moments, very well attended event with spectators filling up stands & making an atmosphere. So many top performances, but for me the  women team dominating the Biathlon event was really special. All 3 of them were just so good & gave top performance. I love it how the female commentator pronounced  Lou Jeanmonnot  & finally grazie mille  we loved it! Thanks for making me fall in love with winter sports again 

Yes. This was the best WOG since at least Sochi 2014. I only started paying attention to the Olympics after London 2012, so small sample size. But, this was the best WOG I can remember. European fans and atmosphere make everything better in my opinion.

[NearPup 4,135]

It was also nice to have actual crowds again. I think the Beijing organizers did the best they could given the COVID regulations that still existed in China at the time, but it sure did dampen the atmosphere *a lot*.

[orangeman 2,850]

Although it was a terrible Olympics for Canada, and my two favourite sports (Hockey and Short Track) really didn't work out for us, there were a couple of fun times. 

 

-Women's Pursuit team winning gold because while it was not unexpected at all, it was still a great triumph against an amazing adversary. 

 

-Dubreuil getting a surprise bronze in speed skating 500m. 

 

-Really all of speed skating, Canada and otherwise. 

 

-I really want to say Dubois getting gold in short track, but the whole thing was a mess. 

 

-The last two ends of the men's curling gold medal game. 

 

-Kingsbury getting gold. But it was more relief than excitement, unfortunately. 

 

-I really like the luge relay. Canada was not involved, unfortunately, but it's always fun to watch. 

 

-Men's freeski big air final was nuts! In all the good ways. That was truly the highest level of competition I've seen in a very long time. 

 

-The dog crossing the finish line in cross country, which should have been the meme of the Olympics (not that...other thing).

Edited yesterday at 02:09 AM by orangeman

[Josh 13,424]

The disappointments still outweigh the positives, by a mile actually but well…(someone should make a thread for that?)
 

For  Canada, in no specific order;

A lot of these are similar to @Topicmaster1010's, but the same moments are standing out to me, there's also one that I'm not ready to mention yet because even though I'm proud of him, at the same time I'm still very disappointed about it. 

 

- Rachel Homan finally winning an Olympic medal after receiving a lot of hate after Pyeongchang 2018 and Beijing 2022 for not making the playoffs in either, she deserves this more than anyone. Also her triple takeout in the 8th against Sweden

- Entire cross country skiing team, no words to describe their performance, except saying they're easily the Canadian team of the Olympics and my expectations were blew out of the water. 

- Piper Gilles/Paul Porier winning an Olympic medal in ice dance, three years ago, Gilles had a cancer diagnosis which put her dreams in jeopardy. Also very special given how many times they've been screwed over by judges this season. 

- One of the greatest to ever do it in freestyle skiing, Mikael Kingsbury, winning gold in the Olympic debut of dual moguls in likely his last event at an Olympic Games.  

- "Sparky" Mark McMorris, coming back from that nasty hard crash during big air training, to not only compete in slopestyle, but finish third in qualifications and land a run in the final to finish 8th. 

- Brad Jacobs winning gold in men's curling as a big "fuck you" to everyone who has been accusing him of cheating online (I still like Edin but still), mostly people who don't understand curling ofc 

- Kelsey Mitchell fulfilling her dreams of becoming a dual summer-winter Olympian finishing 13th in 2-women bobsleigh, after only 8 months of competing in this sport. Insane! 

- Stephen Gogolev finishing 5th in the men's figure skating event, thought top 10-15 would've been what could realistically be expected.

- Megan Oldham winning her first Olympic medal with a bronze in slopestyle, then later on winning a gold in big air, after finishing 4th in big air in Beijing. 

- Deanna Stellato-Dudek becoming an Olympian after hitting her head during a training accident, which had her and Maxime Deschamps miss the figure skating team event.  

- Valerie Maltais winning three Olympic medals in speed skating at 35, team pursuit gold, and 1500m/3000m bronze. At most you could've hoped for 2, one of the 3000m/mass start and the team pursuit. Her winning a medal in the 1500m, can't have imagined it beyond my wildest dreams, it was her first international podium in this event. It's also likely her last Olympics. 

- Brendan Mackay coming up clutch on his last run to win an unexpected bronze in halfpipe as he didn't compete much this season, that being said he did win an event this season. 

- Laurent Dubreuil's surprise medal in the 500m in speed skating
- Courtney Sarault winning four medals, most medals by a Canadian at a Winter Olympics since Klassen in 2006, even though I choose to try and forget about short track. 

 

Then International Athletes, in no specific order;

•  Johan-Olav Botn pointing to the heavens to honour Sivert-Guttorm Bakken 
•  Benny Karl winning back-to-back golds in parallel giant slalom, ofc 
• Totallympian  @brunamoura's Olympic debut (we are all so proud of you)
• Men's freestyle skiing big air final, we were blessed with some insane tricks from the boys   I don’t know if I’ll be able to witness that high of a level in a competition in the next few decades
•  AJ Ginnis' farewell run, because it meant him becoming an Olympian
•  Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo creating history as the first athlete to win 6 Olympic golds in a single games
• One of the greatest alpine skiers of all time,  Federica Brignone, winning her long awaited Olympic gold, and a few days later winning another one, the more special one to me was the super-G though
•  Kacper Tomasiak becoming one of the breakout stars of the games with 3 medals
•  female biathlon team 
•  Von Allmen with an incredible Olympic debut, with 3 golds  
• Nazgul, the dog, crossing the finish line during women's team sprint qualifications 
•  Suvi Minkinnen and especially  Teresa Vobronikova winning bronze medals in biathlon  
•  winning three medals in ski mountaineering, and especially Oriol Cardona Coll with the gold
• More on ski mountaineering,  Marianne Fatton winning gold in the women's event, she seems like a nice person and a great ambassador for the sport. 
•  Mikhail Shaidorov upsetting Malinin to win gold in men's figure skating
•  Sturla Holm Lægrid admitting to cheating on his girlfriend publicly in an interview (kidding) 
•  Nadja Käelin coming from out of nowhere, and having an incredible Olympics
•  Hassleborg and Isabella/Rasmus Wråna winning double gold for Sweden in curling, continuing their legacy in this sport, very happy for all of them as they are all some of my favourite curlers.
•  Tirinzoni winning an Olympic medal in what is likely to be her last Olympics after seeing how dominant she's been ever since the 2018-19 season, same with Pätz if she does hang up her broom. 
•  Riku Miura/Ryuichi Kihara's WR in the pairs free skate 
•  Viktor Thorup medal in the mass start, even though the race was boring
•  Eileen Gu winning gold in halfpipe, after her grandmother passed away the very same day. She didn't know about it until after the event, but I think to me with how she performed, her grandmother seemed to be giving her that extra bit of strength from above. 
• Medal for  Henry Sildaru in halfpipe, and not only a final but a top 8 for  Benjamin Lynch 
•  Elina Ieva Bota winning a medal in women's singles luge
•  Finland’s success in nordic combined with 3 medals, Eero Hirvonen and Ilkka Herola  
• A few curling shots that stood out,  Mouat's run quadruple in the 7th end against Switzerland in the semifinals,  Muskatewitz's quadruple runback double in the 1st end against China and his spinner in the 5th end against Czechia (definitely a few that I'm missing)
• Just seeing how happy everyone was every time one of their athletes either medaled, or did better than expectations, definitely was one of them.