The Winter Olympics end
Monday March 1, 2010 - Email this article to a friend

Canada was at a standstill for the final medal of The Games. 

Hockey is the biggest sport in the country and the match against the USA was as big as it gets.

Think England v Germany in a World Cup Final.

The match was an exciting one with the USA snatching an equaliser with just 24 seconds to go in normal time. At one stage it was pretty one-sided with Canada 2-0 ahead.

In the end Canada won 3-2 in extra time with a sudden death goal.

It was cue for the biggest party the country has ever seen.

Afterwards attention switched to the closing ceremony.

Amy Williams, photo c/o BOAAmy Williams carried the flag for Team GB.

"What an amazing honour to be asked to carry the British flag and lead the way for Team GB. I am hugely thrilled and proud - this really does mean the world to me," says Williams.

"I've been pinching myself ever since I won the gold medal, and now to have this honour come my way is brilliant."

Over 5,000 athletes from 82 countries enjoyed a spectacular show, including musical performances from Michael Buble, Nickelback, Avril Lavigne and Alanis Morrisette, and an inspirational speech from actor Michael J. Fox.

Canadian fans among the 60,000 capacity BC Place stadium were in euphoric mood following their epic ice hockey victory over USA.

IOC President Jacques Rogge thanked Canada for “16 unforgettable days of unique and joyous celebration of Olympism,” and praised the organising committee for “excellent and very friendly Games,” before declaring the XXI Olympic Winter Games closed. In time honoured fashion, he then called upon the youth of the world to meet again in four years time in Sochi, Russia.

So how will the Games be remembered?

It started off with the weather and worries about the venues at Cypress Mountain being available for competition.

A huge effort was made and despite rain, fog and warm temperatures it proved to be the scene of the most significant competition of The Winter Olympics.

The opening was though overshadowed by the tragic death of Nodar Kumaritashvili, the Georgian luge athlete, in training.

It cast a long, long shadow over the Games.

One of the images of The GamesSoon though, once the weather lifted, the competition began.

The weather though continued to play an intermittent role throughout the 2 weeks of competition.

Here at PlanetSKI we reckon the Women's Downhill was the best alpine skiing event and the arrival of ski cross and the snowboard cross, the half pipe and the other events was the most significant development in the sport and one that may have the biggest long term impact.

The ski cross made an amazing entry to The Winter Olympics.

Britain got a gold medal via Amy Williams in the skeleton and, though we have huge respect for our athletes and the difficulties they have been training under, they didn't really live up to expectations and hope.

Some did as expected, a few under performed but no-one really, apart from Williams, excelled themselves.

The reason though, particularly with the skiers and snowboarders, lies more with the sporting authorities than with the athletes themselves.

The problems of Snowpsort GB in the run up to The Games were hardly ideal.

Team GB was set a target of 3 medals by UK Sport and returned with 1.  It was though a gold so it was an improvement on the silver won in Turin. 

No repeat of 2002 curling successWe didn't have the scenes that brought the nation together though like the Women's Curlers did in Salt Lake City in 2002.

Speaking to British journalists in Vancouver the Chef de Mission and head of Team GB, Andy Hunt, was more upbeat.

"We have achieved what we set out to do. We never set ourselves a target. We just said 'better than Turin'. Amy's gold checked off that objective. We would have liked more but that is a good outcome."

However here at PlanetSKI we have enjoyed pretty much every second of the Games via the televison set and the internet, while people we have heard from out in Canada say the atmosphere has been truly amazing.

It is not all about jingoistic excitement as one nation does better than the others. 

We have revelled in the performances of Miller, Svindal, Amman, White, Kowalczyk, Schmid, Anderson, the German speed skating persuit team, McIvor, Bilodeau, The Canadian Ice Hockey team and Kwame Nkrumah-Acheampong.

Does it really matter which country they come from?

We have enjoyed the performances by all the bob sleigh teams and the wonderful trousers worn by the Norwegian male curlers.

Roll on the next 4 years.

We will be keeping up our Winter Olympic area of the site for the next few days so do take a look if you want to re-live a few of the moments and if you feel yourself suffering from any withdrawl symptoms.

Also we have a selection of photographs of our British athletes in the Photos of the week on the home page.

Additional information and photo of Amy Williams from BOA.

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