Here's the latest
• ‘Quad God’ aims for Olympic title: US superstar Ilia Malinin looks to crown himself as the world’s best figure skater with gold today in the men’s individual competition. Maxim Naumov is also in action in the men’s free skate, looking to honor his parents who died in the crash of American Airlines Flight 5342 last year.
• Ukrainian challenges IOC: Skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych was disqualified for defying IOC guidelines banning his helmet featuring images of athletes killed during the war in Ukraine. He has appealed the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
• Yesterday’s highlights: US snowboarding star Chloe Kim settled for silver after South Korea’s Choi Ga-on bested her, dashing her hopes of a third consecutive Olympic gold in the halfpipe event.
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In just 25 years, dozens of places will be too warm to host the Winter Olympics
Jessie Diggins is an endurance athlete. The Olympic cross-country skier describes the intensity of suffering her sport can inflict as a “pain cave.” It doesn’t frighten her; she’s used to digging deep, she can control the pain. What does terrify her, however, is how rapidly her sport is changing because of something completely out of her control: climate change.
She sees the effects everywhere. “I’ve raced World Cups where it was pouring rain and there was barely a strip of snow to ski on, entire seasons were reshaped overnight,” Diggins said. It’s become impossible to hold a winter sporting event without fake snow, she wrote in a blog.
The Milan Cortina Winter Games in the Italian Alps, which will mark Diggins’ final Games, are no different. Snowmaking machines were busy pumping out snow for weeks.
As humans continue to burn planet-heating fossil fuels, winter is changing: Snowfall is declining, snowpack is shrinking and temperatures are rising in many places. Where once mountains were blanketed in thick white powder, many lie bare well into winter.
For those who rely on snow for their livelihoods, every ski season is a nail-biter. For the Winter Olympics, it’s a high-cost, high-stress disaster. Climate change is “reshaping winter sport as we know it,” said a spokesperson for the International Olympic Committee.
As athletes compete in Italy, the future of the Winter Olympics hangs in the balance. People are not just questioning how to keep the Games alive, but whether they should be kept alive at all.
Read and see more about how climate change is imperilling the future of the Winter Games here.
Men's 10km cross-country skiing interval start race begins
It’s not been one of the busy mornings we’ve become used to at these Olympic Games, but nonetheless, our first medal event of the day is underway in the shape of the men’s cross-country skiing 10km interval start free at the Tesero Cross-Country Stadium.
One of the easier events to understand at these Winter Games, competitors start in 30-second intervals and the athlete with the fastest time takes home the gold.
Norway’s Johannes Høsflot Klæbo is the one of the main favorites to take the victory in this event – the 29-year-old has already won two golds at these Games in the 20km skiathlon and cross-country sprint.
The world of sled dog racing keeps on barking, despite not being in the Winter Olympics
One sport which won’t feature at Milan Cortina is the fun and furry practice of sled dog racing.
After debuting as a demonstration sport at the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, the sport never returned, but 94 years later it’s still alive and barking as dogs pull their harnessed drivers, or mushers, around courses across the globe.
Blair Braverman is a long-distance sled dog racer based in Alaska and hopes that, one day, the extended version of the sport will make an Olympic return.
“I would love to see distance mushing in the Olympics. A race takes weeks. And so it’s hard to imagine a single Olympic event that takes weeks at a time,” Braverman told CNN Sports.
“They could send off the teams during the opening ceremonies and then at the end, see who emerges.”
Read more about sled dog racing here.
"He’s won the medal of our hearts": What Ukrainian's DQ from Games means to Ukraine fans
The Ukrainian flag wrapped around her shoulders and its colors painted on her left cheek, Olha Scherhyna stood near the top of the Cortina Sliding Centre and pointed her phone at the big board announcing the start list for the men’s skeleton.
Minutes earlier, the International Olympic Committee had announced that Ukrainian slider Vladyslav Heraskevych had been disqualified from the men’s skeleton for insisting that he would wear a helmet on which were depicted athletes who had been killed in the war with Russia. As the starters scrolled in front of Scherhyna on the board, a red DNS stood next to Heraskevych’s name at the same time an announcer said he would not start.
Using a translate app on her phone to share her opinions, Scherhyna needed no help to convey her emotions. She brought her fists to her eyes to indicate sobbing, before real tears fell down her cheeks. She then reached into the pocket of her white jacket and pulled out a black armband, motioning to me to tie it around her jacket.
On her app, she wrote: “For Ukraine, he is already a winner.’’
Read more about what Heraskevych’s disqualification meant to Ukrainians here.
US curler Rich Ruohonen’s long, winding road to the Olympic Games
The first time Rich Ruohonen tried to make the US Olympic curling team, his current teammates weren’t born. They weren’t around when he made his second go at it, either – or the third for that matter.
Ruohonen is 54, twice the age of his oldest teammate, and has been trying to make an Olympic squad since 1988. Despite a resume stuffed with success – a two-time US Champion, a 2018 world champion – he could not grab onto the Olympic rings.
Some misses have been close – a final shot in 2021 with Jamie Sinclair to make the 2022 Beijing Games was the worst – and some not so close. He thought about not bothering anymore, doubled down on his law practice in 2022, but when Danny Casper – who was meant to lead the US in these Games – suffered last year from an autoimmune disease that made handling the stone impossible, Team USA needed a replacement.
The team turned to Ruohonen and, when Casper was able to return to competition, rewarded the Brooklyn Park, Minnesota-born athlete for his dedication by naming him a team alternate. That did not, however, mean he would actually get to play. But in the round-robin competition here on Thursday, the Olympic spirit finally gave Ruohonen his deserved rewards.
Read more about Ruohonen’s unlikely journey to Olympic history here.
Medal mishaps occurring with some athletes' Olympic prizes
Speaking of Breezy Johnson, in case you missed it, some Olympic medals have broken as soon as athletes have gotten their hands on the coveted rewards. Johnson was the first to find out that some medals have issues when the ribbon broke off her gold medal while she was celebrating.
Does she have advice for those fortunate enough to make the podium?
“Yeah. Don’t jump in them,” she explained at a press conference. “I was jumping in excitement, and it broke. I’m sure somebody will fix it. It’s not crazy broken, but it’s a little broken.”
Johnson later pulled out her prize and showed how the medal itself, the ribbon, the joint between the ribbon and the medal all split apart.
Johnson, who won downhill gold on Sunday, showed the media how her medal, the ribbon and the joint between them split apart.
The issue surfaced again when US figure skater Alysa Liu posted a video on social media showing that her medal had also separated from the ribbon.
Later on, German biathlete Justus Strelow suffered the same fate with his teammate Philipp Nawrath saying, “Justus immediately took advantage of (us having a party) to jump and dance again. Unfortunately, the medal broke at that moment.”
Milan Cortina organizers told CNN they identified a solution, saying, “a targeted fix has been put in place.”
Johnson herself did later say she got a new medal: “I have to get it engraved though, so that needs to happen.”
Breezy Johnson gets engaged at the Winter Olympics
US Olympic gold medalist Breezy Johnson’s partner proposed to her at the finish area at the Winter Olympics yesterday — a moment she had once said she dreamed of at the Games.
US Olympic gold medalist Breezy Johnson got engaged at the Winter Olympics. Her longtime boyfriend, Connor Watkins, proposed to her at the finish area with a sapphire ring—a moment she had once said she dreamed of at the Games.
The story behind this viral celebration at the Winter Olympics
Austrian snowboarder Benjamin Karl knew exactly what he would do if he won a gold medal at this year’s Winter Olympics; what he hadn’t planned for was the reaction from the rest of the world.
After retaining his Olympic parallel giant slalom crown in Livigno on Sunday, the 40-year-old celebrated by ripping off his top, baring his chest to the frenzied crowd, before flexing his muscles and dropping facedown onto the snow.
The impassioned celebration was quickly clipped and shared across social media, with thousands enjoying what initially looked like a release of unbridled, unrehearsed joy.
And while Karl was absolutely over-the-moon with his gold medal moment, the reaction was very much planned as a tribute to his hero, Hermann Maier.
“He was my one and only idol, and I waited my whole career for the right moment to do it, in tribute to him,” Karl told CNN Sports.
Read more about Karl’s wonderful celebration and career here.
The full-throttle, breathtaking sport that’s missing from the Winter Olympics
While the Olympic schedule is full of spectacular sports this year, there is one missing from the agenda – speed skiing.
In fact, speed skiing has only ever been a demonstration event at the Games, wowing audiences at the 1992 Olympics. There are hopes, though, it could feature for real at the next Winter Olympics in 2030.
CNN Sports spoke to the world record holder Simon Billy, who was clocked traveling at 255.500 km/h (158.760 mph) in 2023.
Simon Billy is the fastest man in the world on two skis. In 2023, he set the world record, hurtling down a slope at 158.7 mph. He speaks to CNN about his ambitions and hopes to bring the sport to the 2030 Winter Olympics.
“When I am in my helmet, on my skis, at that moment, everything is just so slow around me. I hear nothing. I don’t see anything either,” he says.
“You have to watch your feet and trust yourself. You have to know the track, and you have to be able to ski down and take the good line.”
Read more about the sport of speed skiing here.
Adults and kids will be collectively disappointed as stoat mascot merch is running out
Apparently, toy versions of the ambassador stoats Tina and Milo are so highly sought after that official stores are running out of stock. That’s going to be disappointing to some enthusiasts, including a CNN correspondent bereft at the “disaster” and a 19-month-old son of another CNN colleague.
Milan Cortina Olympic organizers, who apparently did not account for the demand for mascot merch, say they are talking to their suppliers.
Check out what’s creating all the hype:
What are stoats and how did they become the mascots for the 2026 Winter Olympics? CNN’s Antonia Mortensen introduces Tina, Milo and the six snowdrops named "The Flo."
Medals, politics and a proposal: Catch up on what happened yesterday
Day 6 was full of notable news.
USA and Canada’s hockey victories: The NHL player-packed Team USA opened up their 2026 Milan Cortina Games with a 5-1 victory against Latvia. Boasting a team full of NHL superstars, Team Canada dominated against the Czech Republic 5-0 in its first game at this year’s Olympics.
Dutch skating golds: There was no catching Xandra Velzeboer in women’s 500m short track speed-skating, who broke a world record and won a gold later on in the day. Dutch skater Jens van ‘t Wout won gold in men’s 1000m short track speed-skating about 15 minutes later, timing his finish to perfection to get his toe ahead of the pack.
Chloe Kim takes silver: Only for an athlete like Chloe Kim would it be an upset to get anything less than gold. The snowboarding superstar won Olympic silver in the women’s halfpipe, second to 17-year-old Choi Ga-on who Kim had been a mentor to earlier in her career.
Gold, more gold for Italy: Francesca Lollobrigida came in first in the women’s 5000m speed skating, walking away with a huge smile and her second gold of the Games. Italy’s Federica Brignone claimed gold in the women’s super-G (super giant slalom) in an extraordinary comeback after multiple leg fractures and a torn ACL in April last year.
Austria just makes it: Alessandro Hämmerle slid across the finish line narrowly ahead of his competitors in a nail-biting men’s snowboard cross final.
Sweden’s one-two: Frida Karlsson claimed a second gold medal of these Games in the women’s cross-country skiing 10km, with fellow Swede Ebba Andersson in second. Team USA’s Jessie Diggins clinched the bronze.
Australia’s tie-breaker: Cooper Woods claimed gold in the men’s moguls by way of tiebreaker. He scored the same as Canada’s Mikael Kingsbury but won with better turns.
In other news:
Uproar over Ukrainian disqualification: Vladyslav Heraskevych, the Ukranian athlete disqualified from the Olympics for wearing a helmet with images of athletes killed in the Ukranian war, appealed his disqualification to the International Bobsleigh & Skeleton Federation. He asked to be immediately reinstated in the Games, or to perform a “supervised official run” pending the court’s final decision. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky awarded him with one of Ukraine’s highest honors.
Team USA lost its curling game Thursday but made history: The 54-year-old Rich Ruohonen became the oldest American to compete in the Winter Games.
Breezy Johnson engagement: The American downhill gold medalist was proposed to at the finish of today’s super-G event and she said yes!
CNN’s David Close, Ben Church and Thomas Schlachter contributed to this report.
It's Day 7 of Olympics action. Here are the events to watch
There are seven medal events on tap today:
- Cross-country skiing: Men’s 10km free (interval start)
- Biathlon: Men’s 10km sprint
- Snowboard: Women’s snowboard cross
- Speed skating: Men’s 10000m
- Figure skating: Men’s singles - free skating
- Snowboard: Men’s snowboard halfpipe
- Skeleton: Men’s run 4
Annyeonghaseyo (Hello and good morning)!
Good morning everyone! It’s been an intense Games so far with a lot going on away from the field of play, but also loads happening on it. And that’s not even mentioning the actual golds…
In honor of South Korea and the Korean diaspora taking the top two spots in the women’s snowboard halfpipe (also because my partner is Korean), I have welcomed you all in that wonderful language.
While Chloe Kim might have fallen short of winning a historic three-peat of snowboard titles – picking up the silver medal instead – she showed incredible perspective and humility in her comments after Choi Ga-on shocked the world to win the gold.
The 17-year-old herself showed a resilience to bounce back from what looked like a competition ending injury after crashing in her opening run and not finishing her second run either.
“During the first run, I fell pretty hard, so I think I was a bit shocked. I cried because I thought I wouldn’t be able to compete.
“But the thought kept coming back to me: ‘You can do this. You have to go on’ (and) that’s what pushed me forward.”
Choi needed to do a near perfect run on her third and final attempt and, of course, went on to do so, providing a storyline straight out of a movie.
And that halfpipe final was truly the epitome of the good and the great of the Olympics: human emotion, bounce-back spirit, humility and dreams fulfilled.
And with that, let’s get into Day 7.
