2014 Sochi Winter Olympics
Also called: XXII Olympic Winter Games, 2014 Winter Olympics
Russia’s first Winter Olympics, at Sochi on the Black Sea coast; state-directed doping later came to light and Russia was stripped of many medals.
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Eighty-eight nations took part from 7 to 23 February. New venues were built on the coast of the subtropical resort and in the Caucasus Mountains, at an estimated cost of more than 50 billion dollars. Several Western leaders stayed away from the opening ceremony over Russia’s law banning gay “propaganda”. A few days after the Games, Russia seized Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, annexing it in March.
In 2016 the former head of Moscow’s anti-doping laboratory revealed that state agents had swapped athletes’ urine samples at these Games. Investigations led to many Russian medals being withdrawn, and Russia could not compete under its own name at PyeongChang in 2018.
South Korea won three golds, including Lee Sang-hwa’s second straight women’s 500 m speed-skating title. Kim Yu-na took silver in the women’s singles behind Russia’s Adelina Sotnikova amid controversy over the judging, and then retired. Ahn Hyun-soo, naturalized as a Russian in 2011 as Viktor Ahn, won three short-track golds for Russia.
