10 Great Moments in Recent Winter Olympics History

As someone who lives in the southern part of Australia, the whole winter sports concept is quite foreign to me. The brief glimpse into this world that we get every four years with the Olympic Winter Games is like peeking through the window of an exclusive club—a club that few of us will ever get to join.

Despite this, the glimpse that we get every four years provides some of the most engaging sporting moments that we are likely to see. On the eve of the 2010 Vancouver Games, it is an opportune time to look back and revisit some of those performances that have made their way into Games folklore.

Here is my list, in no particular order, of the best of those memorable moments. (1980 is as far back as my memory goes and although there were undoubtedly many memorable moments before then, I can’t remember them. 1980 wasn’t a bad place to start, though)

Eddie the Eagle

Some people just aren’t meant to fly and Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards is one of those who definitely wasn’t meant to. The affable, but goofy looking Brit gave the impression of an horrific crash desperately looking for somewhere to happen. Every descent down the hill hadthe fans cringing and photographers drooling waiting for the inevitable trainwreck.

Despite his woeful performance on both the 70 and 90 metre ski-jump hills, he landed every jump—usually at about half the distance of everyone else. In the age old tradition, Eddie became a cult hero, but he was so bad that the IOC were forced to change the rules to prevent someone like him qualifying for the games again. To everyone else, however, he typified what sport, if not the Olympics, is all about.

Kerrigan & Harding/Skategate

There are those of us who remain unconvinced that figure skating is actually a sport and those doubts weren’t helped by Tonya Harding’s deranged husband arranging to kneecap Nancy Kerrigan in the lead-up up to the 1994 Lillehammer Games.

As if to prove that the sport is a basket case, the officialdom conspired to drag the sport even deeper into the mire with the infamous “skategate” affair at Salt Lake City in 2002 when the judging was exposed as corrupt and biased—on this occasion a score swap agreement between the French and Russians. It did finally bring about a clean-up of the sport—if that’s what it is.

Steven Bradbury

If ever there was a posterboy for never giving up, it is Steven Bradbury. His staggering, come-from-behind victory in the 1000 metre short track final at the Salt Lake City Games made him an Australian legend. He had been a part of the Australian short track skating scene for over a decade before he got his chance for glory against  the world's best—including favourite, Apolo Anton Ohno.

Bradbury only survived the quarterfinals because of a disqualification and proceeded with a strategy of hanging around in last place and hoping everyone crashed. Amazingly, his strategy worked and falls in the semifinal and then final saw him skate through, unscathed, to achieve Australia’s first ever Winter Olympics gold medal.

Dan Jansen

The Dan Jansen story is one of triumph coming to those who absolutely deserve it. Jansen was at the peak of his powers for the 1988 Calgary games when his sister, Jane, died in the hours before he was to compete. He bravely continued, but fell in both the 500m and 1000m. He failed again in Albertville four years later and looked like he had blown his last chance with a poor performance in the 500m at Lillehammer which was deemed to be his best chance of getting the elusive Olympic medal.

Jansen then seemed destined to be one many outstanding athletes who faltered under the harsh spotlight of Olympic competition. Despite being an unlikely chance in 1000m, Jansen pulled off a remarkable victory, redeeming himself and finally earning an Olympic gold medal that he could dedicate to his sister.

 
Torvill and Dean

If figure skating is borderline as a sport, then ice dancing fails miserably. Nevertheless, Jane Torvill and Christopher Dean put together their hauntingly beautiful "Bolero" routine for the 1984 Sarajevo Games.  It was poetry on ice; well beyond the linguistic ability of a sportswriter to describe adequately. It was more a work of art than one of the all-time great sports performances, but it is an enduring Olympic memory that will probably never be bettered.

Alberto Tomba

The cocky, flashy Italian dominated the slalom and giant slalom at the Calgary Games and did it with the flair of a skiing Austin Powers. After blowing away the competition, he spent the rest of the games trying to shag Katarina Witt—he took his playboy tag very seriously. He came back to win medals at the next two Olympics, but 1988 was his year.

Norway vs. Italy 4x10km Relay

It’s hard to imagine that, after 40 kilometres of cross-country skiing, two teams could be separated by less than a second. This most grueling of races came down to a sprint finish. The Italian team of De Zolt, Albarello, Vanzetta, and Fauner held off the Norwegians to claim victory despite the fast-finishing Norwegian legend Bjorn Daehlie. Not even the greatest cross-country skier of all time could stop the Italians from claiming the remarkable victory.

Herman Maier

Despite being pre-race favourite, the Herminator crashed spectacularly in the downhill race at the 1998 Games in Nagano. The crash saw Maier fly through the air, land on his head and crash through three safety barriers. He shouldn’t have walked away and he certainly shouldn’t have returned three days later to win both the super G and giant slalom.

Maier was to repeat his Lazarus impersonation three years later after a motorcycle crash nearly claimed his life and should have claimed his leg. After massive reconstructive surgery, Maier returned to claim medals in Turin in 2006. He once jokingly referred to himself as immortal, and he may have a point.

Eric Heiden

In an unprecedented, and unrepeated, effort at Lake Placid, Heiden claimed gold in all five speedskating (long-track) events on. From 500 metres to 10,000 metres, Heiden set four Olympic records and one world record in a feat that must rank up with Michael Phelps’ effort in Beijing. In a short, but glittering career, he was all but unbeatable, but his efforts in the 1980 Games guarantee him a place in any list of memorable moments.

Miracle on Ice

In the lead-up to the Beijing Games, I wrote a piece on the most memorable moments of the Summer Olympics. About one-third of the comments criticised my article for not including the Miracle on Ice—the stunning against-all-odds victory of the U.S. ice hockey team against the Soviets—so I daren’t forget it here.

In the context of the cold war, it had implications well beyond that of a chance at an Olympic gold medal but, more than that, it was a victory for the amateurs against the professionals from the USSR and Scandinavia. It was arguably the greatest moment in U.S. sports and inspiration for at least two B-grade movies.