1998 Winter Olympics

The XVIII Olympic Winter Games were held in 1998 in Nagano, Japan. Other candidate cities were Aosta, Italy; Jaca, Spain; Östersund, Sweden; and Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. The selection was in 1991,in Birmingham, United Kingdom.

Highlights

• XC skier Bjørn Dæhlie of Norway won three gold medals in Nordic skiing to become the first winter Olympian to earn eight career gold medals and twelve total medals.
• Snowboarding and curling debuted as official sports and women's ice hockey was introduced to the Olympic program.
• NHL players were able to compete in men's ice hockey due to a three week suspension of the competition.
• Tara Lipinski, 15, won the women's figure skating title to become the youngest champion in an individual event in the history of the Winter Olympics.
• Alpine skier Hermann Maier (Austria) survived a fall in the downhill and went on to gold in the super-g and giant slalom.
• Speed skaters Gianni Romme and Marianne Timmer won two gold medals each for the Netherlands; 5 out of 10 titles in speed skating went to the Netherlands.
• Snowboarder Ross Rebagliati won the gold medal, after initially being disqualified for marijuana usage.
• Azerbaijan, Kenya, the Republic of Macedonia, Uruguay, and Venezuela made their first appearance at these Olympic Winter Games.