There is no doubt ski cross made a triumphant debut at the . It was a firm favourite with the crowds at Cypress Mountain and millions more watched it around the world (the peak ´óÏó´«Ã½ television audience on that Sunday evening was four million.)
Ski cross came hot on the heels of its snowboarding counterpart, which burst on to the Games programme in Turin - and was an instant hit, thanks in no small part to infamous showboating which cost her Olympic gold.
Where once the and the freestyle movement eschewed one another - they are now very much the best of buddies with half-pipe and ski/snowboard cross firmly established.
In four years' time at in Russia another freestyle event - slopestyle - has a very good chance of being included .
If it is successful, Britain would have an excellent chance of a medal as Bristol's is a double X Games gold medallist in the event.
Read the rest of this entry
Great Britain's men's curlers came to Vancouver with one objective - to win Olympic gold.
They were the current world champions and had beaten Canada on the four occasions they had met before the Games began, giving David Murdoch's men what was thought to be a key psychological edge over their major rivals for the title.
But Britain didn't even make the gold medal showdown at Vancouver Olympic Centre. Their hopes and dreams came crashing down around them when they failed to make it to the semi-finals after a galling by European champions Sweden.
Murdoch, Euan Byers, Pete Smith and Ewan MacDonald were crestfallen - the only word they could summon to explain their feelings was "heart-breaking" - and there will now be an inquest into why they performed so poorly when so much was expected of them.
Read the rest of this entry
when he returned home from the last Winter Olympics empty-handed but full of bravado about partying in his rock star-style tour bus and drinking before races.
He then spectacularly fell out with the US ski team, who got fed up with his antics, and formed his own Team America to carry on competing on the World Cup stage.
Just six months ago, he was seriously considering retiring from the sport, preferring to play golf, hang out at the beach and play with his toddler daughter Neesyn Dacey.
But then came the announcement before the season started in October. and wanted another crack at winning an elusive Olympic gold.
And in true Miller style, he has gone from zero to hero at these Games, finally delivering his life's dream of an , to prove he is the ultimate ski all-rounder.
Read the rest of this entry
I've heard it described as a mixture of , motocross and bull riding. I've seen it compared to "a cabbie in New York trying to race through traffic and not crash". And I've heard it being likened to wacky races and the on skis all rolled into one.
Whatever similies and metaphors you choose to describe ski cross it arrived at the with a big bang at a melting Cypress Mountain.
It was making its debut at the 2010 Games in Vancouver, four years after its snowboarding counterpart, and it certainly didn't disappoint.
For the record, Switzerland's will go down in history as the first Olympic ski cross champion, Austria's Andreas Matt and Norway's Audun Groenvold the silver and bronze medallists respectively, but there were plenty of thrills and spills along the way.
Read the rest of this entry
Great Britain v Canada - curling does not get any bigger than that.
Two of the game's heavyweights slugged it out at Vancouver Olympic Centre in front of 6,000 passionate fans - almost all Canadian - and they weren't disappointed by what they saw.
It was an absorbing match which swung one way then the other but ultimately - 7-6 to be precise - to remain unbeaten in the Olympic tournament, with six wins out of six.
Great Britain, the current world champions, were left in a precarious position with three wins and three defeats and realistically need to win their final three round robin games, against the USA, Germany and Norway to advance to the semi-finals.
Read the rest of this entry
Snowboard cross burst on to the Winter Olympics stage four years ago with one of the most memorable stories in Games history as .
So what would the story be at Cypress Mountain in 2010? Would Jacobellis redeem herself, would Canada be celebrating a second gold medal of the Games or would Britain sneak in with their first snowboard medal in Olympic history?
Well, it turned out to be a Canadian success story as local hero lived up to her pre-race favourite tag to seal gold in front of a huge partisan Canadian crowd at her hometown course, just a few miles away from her home in .
Read the rest of this entry
and prepare meticulously for each skeleton race. Using the latest sled technology (provided by ), deciding which steel runners to use and psyching themselves up.
But they cannot help but break into a smile when they are about to push off on the ice, the cheers and cow bells go silent and all of a sudden they can hear quite audibly, "Go, go, go. Love you mummy/daddy."
And that is their two-year-old daughter Ella shouting at the top of her voice. She is their biggest fan and has become an unofficial mascot of the team.
Read the rest of this entry
If Britain's Winter Olympians were unsure about the amount of support and exposure their medal exploits will attract, they were left in no doubt at a rousing reception held in their honour in downtown on the eve of the Games.
There were the usual speeches, the announcement of the flagbearer and team captains and a meet and greet with , the president.
But a really nice touch was the fact more than 1,000 postcards of support have been collated from the worlds of sport, politics and entertainment, as well as the general public, to wish the athletes good luck as Britain aims for a record-breaking medal haul (the current record is four from the 1924 Games).
And 50 of the messages have found their way into a unique keepsake book, of which only 130 have been made for the 52 Winter Olympians and their coaches.
Read the rest of this entry
One of the big stories ahead of the Vancouver Olympics has been the lack of snow at , where the freestyle skiing and snowboarding events are set to take place.
Thankfully, the no-snow crisis has been averted after a that has cost millions of dollars, blowing the contingency budget of the Games into the bargain.
But just as organisers were starting to breathe a sigh of relief, a new danger thatcould threaten the start of the 14-event competition at the mountain just outside Vancouver has loomed large - fog.
Read the rest of this entry
Hi, I'm a senior broadcast journalist covering all sports, but have a particular passion for winter sports. Anything fast and furious like skiing and bobsleigh, and at the other end of the spectrum, the genteel world of cricket and curling. You can also follow me on .
