2010 Olympics

The 2010 Winter Olympics, technically known as the XXI Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Vancouver 2010, informally the 21st Winter Olympics, was an international multi-sport winter event taking place from 12 to 28 February 2010 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with some events taking place in the surrounding suburbs of Richmond, West Vancouver and the University Endowment Lands. Approximately 2600 athletes from 82 nations competed in 86 events in 15 disciplines. The planning committee in Vancouver, headed by John Furlong, had organised for both the Olympic and Paralympic Games. The 2010 Winter Olympics is the third-largest host of Games in Canada and the first in British Columbia. Canada also hosted the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec, and the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Alberta. Metro Vancouver is the largest urban region hosting the Summer Olympics while Calgary is the largest town hosting the Summer Olympics. We are all to be overtaken by Beijing in 2022. In line with Olympic tradition, at the closing ceremonies of the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, the mayor of Vancouver, Sam Sullivan, raised the Olympic flag. The flag was raised on 28 February 2006 at a formal ceremony and was on display at Vancouver City Hall before the Olympic Games opening ceremonies. The festival was officially opened by Governor General Michaëlle Jean joined by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and International Olympic Committee Chairman Jacques Rogge. Canada captured gold for the first time in an international competition at home-hosted Olympic Games, having failed to do so at both the 1976 Montreal Summer Olympics and the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics. Canada clinched their first gold medal on the second day of the tournament and finished fourth in the gold medal tally on the tournament's second to last day, becoming the first host nation since Norway in 1952 to top the gold medal count. Canada broke the record for the most gold medals won at a single Winter Olympics, 13 held in 1976 by the Soviet Union and 14 in 2002 by Norway. In all, the United States won the most medals, their second time at the Winter Olympics, and set the record for the most medals won at a single Winter Olympics with 37, a record held by Germany with 36 medals in 2002 up to that point. Slovak and Belarusian athletes have captured the first gold medals in their country's Winter Olympics. Many venues such as the Richmond Olympic Oval were at sea level, a rarity for the Winter Games. The 2010 Games is also the first indoor opening ceremony — winter or summer — to have been held. Greater Vancouver is the most populous metropolitan city ever to be represented at the Winter Olympics. In February, the month the Games were being played, Vancouver had an average temperature of 4.8 ° C. The mean temperature as measured at Vancouver International Airport for the month of February 2010 was 7.1 ° C. The Olympic Games in Vancouver is broadcast internationally through a number of television networks. Because the rights for the 2010 Games were combined with those for the 2012 Summer Olympics, the broadcasters were practically identical with both competitions. Olympic Broadcasting Services Vancouver, a subsidiary of the current in-house programming network of Olympic Broadcasting Services located within the IOC, became the host broadcaster. The 2010 Olympics marked the first Games at which the host transmission services were only provided by OBS. Nancy Lee, a former director and president at CBC Sports, was the Managing Director at Vancouver's Olympic Broadcasting Services. The flame was lit at Olympia for the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver on 22 October 2009. It then travelled from Greece to Canada's High Arctic, around the North Pole, and on to the West Coast and then on to Vancouver. The relay continued its long voyage through Canada from British Columbia's capital of Victoria. The torch travelled in Canada for about 45,000 kilometres over 106 days, making it the longest relay run in one country's Olympic history. About 12,000 people carried the Olympic torch and visited nearly 1,000 neighbourhoods. The Olympic Torch Relay is the transfer of the Olympic torch from Ancient Olympia, Greece into the civic stadium where the current Olympic Games are held. The fires come just in time for the ceremony to begin.