1968 Winter Olympics

The 1968 Winter Olympics, officially known as the X Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event which was celebrated in 1968 in Grenoble, France and opened on February 6. Thirty-seven countries participated. Norway won the most medals, the first time a country other than the USSR had done so since the USSR first entered the Winter Games in 1956.

Frenchman Jean-Claude Killy won three gold medals in all the alpine skiing events. In women's figure skating, Peggy Fleming won the only United States gold medal. The games have been credited with making the Winter Olympics more popular in the United States, not least of which because of ABC's extensive coverage of Fleming and Killy, who became overnight sensations among teenage girls.

The year 1968 marked the first time the IOC first permitted East and West Germany to enter separately, and the first time the IOC ever ordered drug and gender testing of competitors.

Host city selection

Grenoble went against five other candidate cities for the 1968 Winter Olympics. Here was the resulting vote count that occurred at the 61st IOC Session in Innsbruck, Austria, on January 28, 1964. Information can be seen from the web page called the International Olympic Committee Vote History.

1968 Winter Olympics Bidding Results
City	NOC Name	Round 1	Round 2	Round 3
Grenoble	France	15	18	27
Calgary, Alberta	Canada	12	19	24
Lahti	Finland	11	14	-
Sapporo	Japan	6	-	-
Lake Placid, New York	United States	3	-	-
Oslo	Norway	1	-	-

Highlights

• Grenoble 1968 is the first Olympiad to adopt a mascot, although unofficially. Schuss, the mascot, is a styled skier. ^[1]
• Norway came away from the Games with the most medals: 6 gold, 6 silver, and 2 bronze.
• In the downhill skiing event, French hero Jean-Claude Killy won the gold medal with a time of 1:59.85.
• Killy also swept the other men’s Alpine events, but only after one of the greatest controversies in the history of the Winter Olympics. Austrian superstar Karl Schranz claimed that a mysterious man in black crossed his path during the slalom race, causing him to skid to a halt. Given a restart, Schranz beat Killy’s time. However, a Jury of Appeal disqualified Schranz and gave the medal to Killy.^[2]
• The East German women’s luge team, who had won gold, silver, and fourth, were all disqualified for heating their runners.
• Swedish skier Toini Gustafsson was a star in women’s cross-country events, winning both individual races and earning a silver medal in the relay.
• American figure skater Peggy Fleming built up a huge lead after the compulsory figures and easily won the first-place votes of all nine judges.^[3]
• Elegant married couple Lyudmila Belousova and Oleg Protopopov successfully defended their pairs figure skating title from Innsbruck for the Soviet Union.
• Fabled Italian bobsleigh pilot Eugenio Monti drove both the two-man and four-man events to win gold.
• All bobsleigh contests had to be scheduled to start before sunrise and end shortly after dawn because the track at L'Alpe d'Huez was designed with insufficient cooling capability and could not keep the ice solid in bright daylight.
• In speed skating, the women’s 3,000m event turned out to be particularly fast, with the first 10 finishers beating the previous Olympic record set in Squaw Valley in 1960. However, the gold medallist, the Netherlands’ Johanna “Ans” Schut, was unable to beat the world record--until the next year on the same oval in Grenoble.
• Sex tests for women were introduced.
• This Olympics was the first to use Bugler's Dream by Leo Arnaud as the theme for Olympic television coverage by ABC. It was also the first Olympics to be broadcast in color.

Venues

• City venues
  • Opening Stadium (Stade Inaugural) - opening ceremonies
  • Speed Circuit¹ (L'Anneau de Vitesse) - speed skating
  • Ice Stadium¹ (Le Stade de Glace) - ice hockey, figure skating, closing ceremonies
  • Municipal Skating Rink² (La Patinoire Municipale) - ice hockey
• Mountain venues
  • Chamrousse - men's alpine skiing
  • Recoin de Chamrousse - women's alpine skiing
  • Autrans - cross-country skiing, biathlon
  • Bobsleigh Run¹ (Piste de Bobsleigh), Alpe d'Huez - bobsleigh
  • Toboggan Run¹ (Piste de Luge), Villard-de-Lans - luge
  • 70-meter Ski Jump¹ (Tremplin de 70 Mètres), Autrans - ski jumping
  • 90-meter Ski Jump¹ (Tremplin de 90 Mètres), Saint-Nizier-du-moucherotte - ski jumping

¹ New facilities constructed in preparation for the Olympic Games.
² Existing facilities modified or refurbished in preparation for the Olympic Games.

Medal winners

Bronze medal

• Alpine skiing
• Biathlon
• Bobsleigh
• Ice hockey
• Figure skating
• Luge
• Nordic skiing
  • Cross-country skiing
  • Nordic combined
  • Ski jumping
• Speed skating

Participating nations

A total of 37 nations sent athletes to compete at these Games. Morocco competed at the Winter Games for the first time in Grenoble. East Germany and West Germany sent independent teams to the Games for the first time.

Medal count

Main article: 1968 Winter Olympics medal count

These are the top ten nations that won medals at the 1968 Winter Games.

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Norway	6	6	2	14
2	Soviet Union	5	5	3	13
3	France (host nation)	4	3	2	9
4	Italy	4	0	0	4
5	Austria	3	4	4	11
6	Netherlands	3	3	3	9
7	Sweden	3	2	3	8
8	West Germany	2	2	3	7
9	United States	1	5	1	7
10	East Germany	1	2	2	5
	Finland	1	2	2	5

References

1. ↑ Mascots
2. ↑ www.Olympic.org
3. ↑ Beijing 2008

External links

• The program of the 1968 Grenoble Winter Olympics