Winter Games begin with opening ceremony in multiple locations across northern Italy
Fireworks explode around the Olympic rings during the Olympic opening ceremony of the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Friday, Feb. 6. AP-Yonhap
MILAN — The 2026 Winter Olympic Games kicked off Friday with an opening ceremony taking place simultaneously in multiple locations across northern Italy, an unprecedented setup necessitated by the geographic spread of the competition.
With a celebration of Italy's culture, creativity and beauty, along with a tribute to a message of peace and dialogue, the Milan-Cortina Winter Games began with some 2,900 athletes from 92 countries spread over an area of about 22,000 square kilometers -- making this the most spread-out Olympics ever, winter or summer.
The first Winter Games in Italy in 20 years bear the name of two main host cities, Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo, some 400 kilometers apart. There will also be two other clusters of venues, one for alpine skiing and snowboarding, and another for ski jumping and cross-country skiing.
Milan, the financial capital of Italy, will host all skating events and the men's and women's hockey tournaments. Milano San Siro Olympic Stadium, home of Italian football giants AC Milan and Inter Milan, hosted the main ceremony held under the theme of harmony.
Three other places also hosted athletes competing in skiing, snowboarding, curling and sliding events for their own ceremonies -- Cortina d'Ampezzo, Livigno in the Alps, and Predazzo in the northern province of Trento. Some countries chose to have separate flag bearers in the Parade of Nations in different spots, allowing them to represent their countries without having to travel hundreds of kilometers to Milan.
This year's Olympics will also have two Olympic cauldrons for the first time, one at the iconic Arco della Pace, outside Milano San Siro Olympic Stadium, and the other in Piazza Angelo Dibona in Cortina d'Ampezzo.
Three Olympic alpine skiing gold medalists lit the cauldrons at the end of the ceremony: triple champions Alberto Tomba and Deborah Compagnoni in Milan, and the 2018 women's downhill champion Sofia Goggia in Cortina d'Ampezzo. They will stay lit until the closing ceremony, Feb. 22.
The cauldron measures about 3.1 meters in diameter and can expand to around 4.5 meters when fully open. A gas burner is at the center.
The organizing committee said the widespread edition is "a model that represents the future of the Winter Olympics," with an aim of making use of as many existing venues as possible and also "to leverage the sporting tradition and expertise of the territories involved in the Games' organization."
The opening ceremony had references to a trio of Italian opera maestros, Giuseppe Verdi, Giacomo Puccini and Gioachino Rossini, while other links to the country's rich cultural heritage included a performance by tenor Andrea Bocelli and a tribute to the late fashion designer Giorgio Armani, who designed uniforms for the Italian Olympians for decades.
Also, the cauldrons' design pays homage to Leonardo da Vinci and his "Knots," which, according to the organizing committee, "express the harmony between nature, human ingenuity, and technical expertise."
South Korea will have 71 athletes competing in six sports, and they will look to take home at least three gold medals, one more than their tally at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.
Figure skater Cha Jun-hwan and speed skater Park Ji-woo, both three-time Olympians, served as South Korea's flag bearers in Milan, with the country entering Milano San Siro Olympic Stadium as the 22nd nation, based on the Italian alphabet. According to the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee, 35 athletes and 15 officials attended Friday's ceremonies, including 15 athletes and six officials based in Milan.
By tradition, Greece, the birthplace of the modern Olympics, is the first to march in, while the host country Italy was the last.