Meet the U.S. Figure Skating Team Juliet MacurReporting from the Beijing Olympics ⛸ James Hill for The New York Times Mariah Bell, 25, is proof that experience and perseverance still matter. Last month, she became the oldest female U.S. singles champion in 95 years. Her soulful, balletic performance to the song “Hallelujah” will give you goosebumps. NYT
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi discouraged Olympic athletes from protesting at the opening ceremony in Beijing on Thursday, saying that it wasn’t worth the risk of reprisal from a “ruthless” Chinese government. Pelosi said that she and other politicians would speak out against China’s human rights record, but that athletes would be at risk if they use their platforms to protest. “I would say to our athletes: You’re there to compete,” she said. “Do not risk incurring the anger of the Chinese government, because they are ruthless.” It is not known…
There will surely be wonders, because there always are at an Olympic Games. Someone — quite possibly someone you have never heard of — will dazzle with speed or grace or ferocity or pluck. But there is a certain sadness to the Beijing Winter Games, which officially open on Friday. Be it politics or policy or pandemic, the Olympics have become subdued in the very city that, in 2008, made them into a wondrous, ambitious and abiding spectacle. Thousands of visitors from all corners of the world have descended on…
What to Know Ahead of the Olympics Andrew Keh��Reporting from Beijing Are any countries boycotting the Games? China’s record on human rights, including the abuse of Uyghur Muslims in the country’s Xinjiang region and the suppression of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, has led activists around the world to call for countries and sponsors to boycott the Beijing Games. Several countries, including the United States, Australia, Britain and Canada, have announced a “diplomatic boycott” of the Games, meaning their government officials will not attend any ceremonies or events. NYT
How I Made It to the Beijing Olympics Alan BlinderReporting on the Olympic Games ⛷ China is hosting this year’s Winter Olympics in a bubble. For me, the bubble formed not in Beijing — but more than 5,000 miles away, at Charles de Gaulle Airport, outside of Paris. Here’s what my trip looked like → NYT
A supervisor in Germany’s Olympic delegation has tested positive for the coronavirus within the closed loop in Beijing, the German Olympic Sports Confederation said on Thursday, confirming one of the first cases connected to an athletic team within the bubblelike environment meant to shield participants from the rest of the world. The positive case was identified on Sunday after a P.C.R. test administered in Zhangjiakou, where many of the snow events will take place about 100 miles northwest of Beijing, the confederation said. The supervisor is asymptomatic and is currently…
The American ski racer Breezy Johnson, a top contender for a gold medal at next month’s Beijing Olympics in the women’s downhill, said on Monday that she would not compete in the Games because of torn right knee cartilage she sustained in the second of two high-speed training crashes this month. Saying she was heartbroken, Johnson conceded that she contemplated trying to race despite the condition of her injured knee. “But the doctors told me I could do a lot more damage,” Johnson said in a telephone interview from Germany.…
The Olympic torch’s public journey to the opening ceremony of the Winter Games will be much more lonely and with much less fanfare. The torch relay, usually global and lasting for months, will be just three days, mostly local, and open only to select members of the public, according to organizers of the Beijing Olympics. “This torch relay will always prioritize safety,” Yang Haibin, an official from the organizing committee, said at a news briefing on Friday. The route will feature stops at the Great Wall, the Summer Palace, and…
China had already barred foreign spectators from attending the Winter Games that begin in Beijing in less than a month. On Monday, it announced that most Chinese people won’t be able to attend either. Citing the evolving threat from the coronavirus pandemic, the Beijing 2022 organizing committee announced that it was ending ticket sales to the events “to ensure the safety of all participants and spectators.” The decision came less than two days after health authorities reported Beijing’s first case of the Omicron variant and ordered an immediate lockdown and…
When China’s leader Xi Jinping inspected the Beijing Winter Olympics venues last week, he laid out his vision for a “green, safe and simple” event. But diplomatic boycotts and, increasingly, the fast-spreading Omicron variant of the coronavirus may make safety and simplicity near impossible to achieve, at least by Beijing’s stringent “zero Covid” standards. With less than a month to go until the opening of the Winter Games, Chinese officials are racing to extinguish a spate of coronavirus infections around the country, including several locally transmitted cases of the Omicron…