The modern Olympic Games are the world's leading international sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games are considered the world's foremost sports competition, with more than 200 teams, representing sovereign states and territories, participating. By default, the Games generally substitute for any world championships during the year in which they take place. The Olympics are staged every four years. Since 1994, they have alternated between the Summer and Winter Olympics every two years during the four-year Olympiad.
The Winter Olympic Games, also known as the Winter Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympic Games, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were held in Chamonix, France. The modern Olympic Games were inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, which were held in Olympia, Greece, from 776 BCE to 394 CE. The Baron Pierre de Coubertin of France founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) 1,500 years later in 1894, leading to the first modern Summer Olympic Games in Athens, Greece in 1896. The IOC is the governing body of the Olympic Movement, with the Olympic Charter defining its structure and authority. The original five Winter Olympic Sports were bobsleigh, curling, ice hockey, Nordic skiing, and skating. The Games were held every four years from 1924 to 1936, interrupted in 1940 and 1944 by World War II, and resumed in 1948. Until 1992, the Summer Olympic Games and the Winter Olympic Games were held in the same year. A decision to change this was made in 1986, when during the 91st International Olympic Committee session, IOC members decided to alternate the Summer Olympic Games and the Winter Olympic Games on separate four-year cycles in even-numbered years. Also, at that same congress it was decided that 1992 Winter Olympics would be the last to be held in the same year as the Summer Games and that to change the rotation, the games that would be held in 1996 would be brought forward by two years, being scheduled to 1994. After those games, the next were to be held in 1998 when the four-year Olympic Cycle resumed.
Irina Anatolyevna Privalova is a Russian Olympic gold medallist athlete. Her Summer Olympics debut was in 1992 in the sprint events, where she won two medals— a bronze in the 100 m and running the anchor leg in the 4x100 team, a silver — and came fourth in the 200, representing the Unified Team. With three European individual championships and three individual world medals, Irina Privalova had been a formidable competitor during most of the 1990s but had not yet won an outdoor international event gold medal.
The 1976 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad, were a summer multi-sport event held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, from July 17 to August 1, 1976. A total of 6,084 athletes from 92 countries represented by National Olympic Committees (NOCs) participated in these Games, competing in 198 events in 23 sports.
Mariel Leigh Zagunis is an American sabre fencer. She is a two-time Olympic champion in the individual sabre and the first American woman to win a gold medal in fencing at the Olympics. She was Team USA flag bearer in the 2012 Summer Olympics Parade of Nations. She has two Olympic bronze team medals and is a five-time Olympian.
Nellie Vladimirovna Kim is a retired Soviet and Belarusian gymnast of Sakhalin Korean and Tatar descent who won three gold medals and a silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, and two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. She was the second woman in Olympic history to earn a perfect 10 score and the first woman to score it on the vault and on the floor exercise, rivaling Nadia Comăneci, Ludmilla Tourischeva, and other strong competitors of the 1970s.
Ice hockey tournaments have been staged at the Olympic Games since 1920. The men's tournament was introduced at the 1920 Summer Olympics and was transferred permanently to the Winter Olympic Games program in 1924, in France. The women's tournament was first held at the 1998 Winter Olympics.
Kathleen Joan Heddle, was a Canadian Olympic rower. She and her long-time rowing partner Marnie McBean were the first Canadians to be awarded three Olympic gold medals at the Summer Games. They also won a silver in double sculls at the 1994 World Championships.
Canada has sent athletes to every Winter Olympic Games and every Summer Olympic Games since its debut at the 1900 games with the exception of the 1980 Summer Olympics, which it boycotted along with the USA and other countries. Canada has won at least one medal at every Olympics in which it has competed. The Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) is the National Olympic Committee for Canada.
Katrine Lunde is a Norwegian professional handball goalkeeper for Vipers Kristiansand and the Norwegian national team.
Eve Muirhead is a Scottish former curler from Perth and the skip of the British Olympic Curling team. Muirhead and the GB team became Olympic champions at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, having previously won the bronze medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.
Ria Dawn Percival is a professional footballer who plays as a defensive midfielder. Born in England, she played for the New Zealand women's national team and represented New Zealand 166 times, more than any other player, male or female. She previously played for FFC Frankfurt and FF USV Jena of the Bundesliga, FC Basel in the Swiss league and West Ham United.
Irina Vladimirovna Kalinina is a former Soviet diver and olympic champion. She competed at the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow, where she won the gold medal in Women's 3 metre springboard.
The following is a list of commentators to be featured in CBC Television's Olympic Games coverage.
Katerine Savard is a Canadian former competitive swimmer who specializes in women's butterfly events and freestyle relay. She holds several Canadian national records in the butterfly over the 50-, 100-, and 200-metre distances in both the short and long courses. Savard also holds the Canadian junior butterfly record in the 200-metre event. She won the gold medal at the 100-metre butterfly event at the 2013 Summer Universiade, held in Kazan. Savard also won gold at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in the 100-metre butterfly in Glasgow, where she set the Commonwealth record in the process. At the same games, she won a bronze medal as a member of the women's 4×100-metre medley relay team.
Azza Besbes is a Tunisian sabre fencer, five-time African champion. She took part in the 2008, 2012 and 2016 Summer Olympics, finishing 7th, 9th and 5th respectively.
Yelena Anatolyevna Tkach is a Russian sport shooter. Representing the former Soviet Union, Tkach won a silver medal in the women's double trap at the 1991 ISSF World Shooting Championships in Perth, Australia, with a total score of 121 clay pigeons. She also defeated Lithuania's Daina Gudzinevičiūtė by one point for the gold medal in the women's trap at the 2002 ISSF World Shooting Championships in Lahti, Finland, accumulating a score of 93 targets. Tkach is also a member of the shooting team for Dynamo Voronezh, and is coached and trained by her teammate and two-time Olympian Maxim Kosarev.
Alexandra Aleksandrovna "Sasha" Vafina is a Russian ice hockey forward and member of the Russian national ice hockey team, currently playing in the Zhenskaya Hockey League (ZhHL) with Dinamo-Neva Saint Petersburg.
Katie Ann Laurie is an Australian equestrian. She competed for New Zealand in show jumping at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
