The Winter Olympics have wrapped up and Canada came away with 21 medals — five of which are gold. Our hearts broke with our hockey loss to the U.S., but our heads are high. Throughout, the world’s athletes were stickhandling, twizzling and slaloming apace at the Winter Games. Dreams came true, hopes were crushed, and it all played out online for a populace desperate for some light relief. That was a recipe for some viral moments.
If you weren’t able to scroll OlympicsTok all day every day — a full-time job in addition to actually watching the events, and whatever your actual job is — here are the top moments that captured attention from Milan-Cortina.
Closing ceremony first to be held in a UNESCO world heritage site
No, not the Coliseum — that’s in Rome — but another ancient Roman monument had the honour of being the first UNESCO World Heritage Site to host an Olympics closing ceremony. About 2,000 years after it hosted its first crowds, the Verona arena was the setting for tonight’s closing ceremonies.
Centred on the theme of “beauty in action,” the ceremony celebrated Italian art and culture, from opera to classical music and down to the Murano blown-glass vessel holding the Olympic flame. Because this games had two hubs, Milan and Cortina, the symbolic cauldron was extinguished in two places, another Olympic first.
Fun fact: Because fireworks are illegal in Verona, organizers treated the athletes and 12,000 spectators to a light show instead.
Canada Women’s hockey team not impressed by consolation stuffies
There’s a time and a place for a plush toy. Based on the less-than-impressed reactions by the Canadian women’s hockey players, it is maybe not when you’ve just lost out on a gold medal by a single point.
As a sort of consolation prize, the Canadian players were each handed a stuffed toy of Tina the stoat, this year’s Olympic mascot. Their faces, disappointed by the loss and clearly unimpressed by being handed a plushie instead of the gold they were fighting for, went viral.
“Let them grieve in peace,” said one X user.
Team USA includes Johnny Gaudreau’s kids in group photo
While that overtime loss remains deeply painful, as Canadians we’re big enough people to acknowledge a poignant moment when we see one. Case in point: While celebrating their gold medal win on Sunday, the American men’s hockey team had everyone tearing up while honouring hockey player Johnny Gaudreau, killed alongside his brother in a road accident 18 months ago.
First, they brought out his number 13 jersey, nodding to the fact that Gaudreau, widely acknowledged as one of the best players of his generation, would almost certainly have been on this Olympic team if he were alive. Then, Matthew Tkachuk and Zach Werenski brought Gaudreau’s two children out onto the ice, making sure that Noa and Johnny Jr (who actually turns two today) were included in the team photo.
And who knows: His spirit might somehow be involved in Canada’s heartbreaking loss. Team USA centre Dylan Larkin certainly thinks so, joking that he felt both Gaudreau brothers’ presence during the games. “Somehow, they put a spell around our net where the puck didn’t go in,” he said.
A gold medallist hugs her nanny
Bobsledder Elana Meyers Taylor sparked two big conversations when she won Olympic gold for Team U.S.A. in the monobob event. There’s the fact that it’s her first gold, at age 41, making her the oldest woman to ever win an individual gold at a Winter Olympics. This is helping to normalize women competing for longer, as are 41-year-old skier Lindsey Vonn and 42-year-old Canadian figure skater Deanna Stellato-Dudek.
But it’s the image of Meyers Taylor hugging her children’s nanny after her win that’s really caught the public’s imagination.
The mother of two has previously spoken about the challenges of parenting while being a professional athlete. “My number one goal in life is to take care of my children: make sure they’re healthy and happy and that they grow up to be kind people. They are my priority; they come before anything bobsleigh related,” she said earlier this year. “My kids travel with me, so we’re on the road together. We have a nanny with us, and my husband comes in when he can, though he works full time.”
The image has resonated with other parents — women especially — who know firsthand the importance of child care. “This is being a working mother,” said one Instagram user, posting about the moment. “And the credit she gives her nanny for the support — it takes a village.”
Canadian curler warned about swearing
It was a not-so-winning moment for Canada’s international reputation as mild-mannered and polite: Canadian curler Marc Kennedy let loose in a heated exchange when a Swedish opponent accused him of cheating in a round-robin game. “Just f—k off,” he said to Oskar Eriksson, who claimed to have video evidence of the alleged foul play. “I don’t give a s—t.”
The World Curling Federation, which didn’t agree with the cheating accusation, issued a verbal warning to the Canadian team about language, adding that “further inappropriate behaviour” could result in “sanctions.”
Former skating rivals get engaged on Valentine’s Day
Sports romance novel authors should pay attention to Olivia Smart and Jean-Luc Baker’s love story. Once upon a time, they were ice-dancing rivals, competing against each other at the Beijing Olympics — Baker (a British-born American) confessed his love for Smart (also British-born but represents Spain) in the midst of those Games. Fast forward a decade and he popped the question on Valentine’s Day on the streets of Milan, days after Smart came ninth in the ice dancing competition.
“It’s always been you,” wrote Baker on Instagram, sharing a video of him carrying the ring around the Olympics, and then finally dropping to one knee on a rainy day in the Italian capital. She said yes.
The “line guy” takes the spotlight
A breakout star of Milan Cortina has been the “line guy,” thanks to a video captured by British skier Kirsty Muir that has more than six million views on TikTok. She paid tribute to the behind-the-scenes Olympic staffer whose role it is to re-spray the perfectly straight lines that run across the hill during the big air ski competition — and it’s all done on skis! The cheering crowd appreciated the effort, too.
A biathlete’s affair confession
Whatever else the highly decorated Norwegian athlete Sturla Holm Laegreid achieves in his sporting career, it’ll almost certainly be overshadowed by the fact that he won a bronze medal in biathlon — and then immediately gave a television interview in which he confessed to cheating on his girlfriend.
“Half a year ago, I met the love of my life. The world’s most beautiful and nicest person. Three months ago I made the mistake of my life and cheated on her, and I told her about that a week ago,” Laegreid told a reporter on camera, apropos of nothing. “This has been the worst week of my life.”
His teammate won gold, and dedicated the victory to another biathlete who had died.
Laegreid later apologized again, this time for “revealing this personal story on a happy day for Norwegian biathlon.” He said, “I am not myself and not thinking clearly.”
Athletes say their medals are breaking
“Do not jump in them!” That’s the stern warning being given to athletes after a rash of medal malfunctions occurred as athletes celebrated their wins. Breezy Johnson, the American skier, said her gold medal broke before she even got to her press conference. “It came apart,” she said, identifying the issue as the attachment between the ribbon that goes around the neck and the medal itself.
American figure skater Alysa Liu also posted on social media about her gold medal breaking, writing: “My medal don’t need the ribbon.”
Related: Olympic gold medals aren’t actually solid gold (likely a relief given the price of the precious metal is at record highs). They’re made of pure silver encased in a layer of gold.
The chocolate lava cake is the new chocolate muffin
At the Paris Olympics, athletes raved about a particular chocolate muffin served in the athletes village cafeteria. In Milan, there’s a new viral dessert at the canteens: The tortino cuore fondente, which is a chocolate lava cake. Canadian speedskater Courtney Sarault was among the first to alert the world to its gooey, warm existence in a viral TikTok post captioned “found the Winter Olympics chocolate muffin” with over 340K likes.
There is a rival dessert, however: In a viral video, Swiss snowboarder Jonas Hessler proclaimed Milan’s tiramisu “the new chocolate muffin,” rating it a 12/10 and arguing it’s always the first dessert to vanish from the buffet.
Canadian Olympian Natalie Spooner’s food reviews go viral
It’s non-stop action in the athlete canteen: Canadian hockey player Natalie Spooner has been reviewing various items on the menu in the Olympic Village, and TikTok is eating it up.
Her six videos in a series she’s dubbed “Spooner’s chocolate monster reviews” have racked up over 2 million views so far, with her thoughts on a mid chocolate pudding reaching over 1 million views alone. Her verdict on the chocolate lava cake, by the way? A rave review and a score of 9.1/10.
Snoop Dogg was all of us reacting to Lindsey Vonn’s crash
When veteran American skier Lindsey Vonn crashed just seconds into her comeback attempt, Snoop Dogg was standing in the crowd at the bottom of the hill, wearing a jacket with her face printed on it. His blank yet horrified expression, mirroring everyone else’s, went viral.
Later, the rapper who started out as Olympic comedic relief but has become something of an “honorary coach” told NBC: “She needs to know that we love her. The people around the whole world love her. I was there at the venue. When she took the fall, the whole stadium clapped. They stood up in love and were giving her appreciation as she flew away in the helicopter. She is a total inspiration.”
Vonn is stable now but will need more surgeries for her broken leg.
Milan-Cortina is full of Canadian Olympic couples
Fittingly for a games that falls over Valentine’s Day, there are quite a few Canadian couples with both partners in competition this year. We’ve got married hockey players Marie-Philip Poulin and Laura Stacey, both going for gold in women’s hockey.
There’s also husband-wife duo Brett Gallant and Jocelyn Peterman competing together in mixed doubles curling — they fell in love after Gallant asked Peterman to be his curling partner. Their son, Luke, is also in Milan to cheer them on.
A post-race proposal
There are surprise proposals, and then there’s your boyfriend waiting for you with a ring at the bottom of the slope after you’ve just crashed out of your medal-contending ski race. Luckily, American Breezy Johnson, who won the gold medal in the same downhill event where Lindsay Vonn crashed, always dreamed of being proposed to at the Olympics. “It felt fitting combining my two loves,” she said of the moment. “And also you get free photography.”
Canada’s men’s hockey team do the wave
Athletes, they’re just like us! Courtesy of Mitch Marner, a clip of the Canadian men’s hockey team caught doing the wave while spectating at a skating event has spread like wildfire.
“Reverse uno card moment,” is how Marner captioned the varying degrees of enthusiasm — some intense concentration, some very half-hearted hand raising — shown by his team as they participated in this ancient crowd ritual.
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