The
1976 Winter Olympics
The 1976 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XII Olympic Winter Games (german: XII. Olympische Winterspiele, french: XIIes Jeux olympiques d'hiver) and commonly known as Innsbruck 1976 ( bar, Innschbruck 1976, label=Austro-Bavarian), was a ...
, officially known as the XII Olympic Winter Games, was a winter
multi-sport event
A multi-sport event is an organized sporting event, often held over multiple days, featuring competition in many different sports among organized teams of athletes from (mostly) nation-states. The first major, modern, multi-sport event of interna ...
held in
Innsbruck
Innsbruck (; bar, Innschbruck, label=Bavarian language, Austro-Bavarian ) is the capital of Tyrol (state), Tyrol and the List of cities and towns in Austria, fifth-largest city in Austria. On the Inn (river), River Inn, at its junction with the ...
,
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
, from 4 to 15 February 1976. A total of 1,123 athletes representing 37
National Olympic Committee
A National Olympic Committee (NOC) is a national constituent of the worldwide Olympic movement. Subject to the controls of the International Olympic Committee, NOCs are responsible for organizing their people's participation in the Olympic Games ...
s (NOC) participated in 37 events from 10 different
sports and disciplines.
Two events were contested for the first time: the
figure skating
Figure skating is a sport in which individuals, pairs, or groups perform on figure skates on ice. It was the first winter sport to be included in the Olympic Games, when contested at the 1908 Olympics in London. The Olympic disciplines are me ...
discipline of
ice dancing
Ice dance (sometimes referred to as ice dancing) is a discipline of figure skating that historically draws from ballroom dancing. It joined the World Figure Skating Championships in 1952, and became a Winter Olympic Games medal sport in 1976. Ac ...
, and the men's 1,000 metres in
speed skating
Speed skating is a competitive form of ice skating in which the competitors racing, race each other in travelling a certain distance on Ice skate, skates. Types of speed skating are long track speed skating, short track speed skating, and marath ...
.
![1964 Winter Olympics USSR stamp](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b1/1964_Winter_Olympics_USSR_stamp.jpg)
Sixteen NOCs won at least one medal, and twelve of them secured at least one gold. The
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
clinched the first place in the gold and overall medal counts, with 13 and 27, respectively. Moreover, the Soviet team also collected the most silver (6) and bronze (8) medals. The host nation,
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
, concluded its participation with a total of six medals (two golds, two silvers, and two bronzes).
Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein (), officially the Principality of Liechtenstein (german: link=no, Fürstentum Liechtenstein), is a German-speaking microstate located in the Alps between Austria and Switzerland. Liechtenstein is a semi-constitutional monarchy ...
won its first Olympic medals: two bronzes by
Willi Frommelt
Willi Frommelt (born 18 November 1952) is a former Alpine skier from Liechtenstein who won a bronze medal in the slalom at the 1976 Olympics.
Curiously during his career, Frommelt had only one podium finish in the World Cup events but four at th ...
and
Hanni Wenzel
Hannelore (Hanni) Wenzel. vancouver2010.com. 23 January 2010 (born 14 December 1956) is a retired Liechtensteiner alpine ski racer. Weirather is a former Olympic, World Cup, and world champion. She won Liechtenstein's first-ever Olympic medal at ...
in the
alpine skiing
Alpine skiing, or downhill skiing, is the pastime of sliding down snow-covered slopes on skis with fixed-heel bindings, unlike other types of skiing ( cross-country, Telemark, or ski jumping), which use skis with free-heel bindings. Whether for ...
slalom events.
East German
East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...
athletes achieved gold medal sweeps in
luge
A luge is a small one- or two-person sled on which one sleds supine (face up) and feet-first. A luger steers by using the calf muscles to flex the sled's runners or by exerting opposite shoulder pressure to the seat. Racing sleds weigh for s ...
and
bobsleigh
Bobsleigh or bobsled is a team winter sport that involves making timed runs down narrow, twisting, banked, iced tracks in a gravity-powered sleigh. International bobsleigh competitions are governed by the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Feder ...
,
which accounted for five of the country's seven Olympic titles. Alpine skier
Rosi Mittermaier
Rosa Anna Katharina Mittermaier-Neureuther (; 5 August 1950 – 4 January 2023) was a German alpine skier. She was the overall World Cup champion in 1976 and a double gold medalist at the 1976 Winter Olympics.
Mittermaier competed in alpine sk ...
won the women's downhill and slalom events to give
West Germany
West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
's two gold medals in these Games. She came close to winning a third in the giant slalom, which would have made her the first woman to win all three Olympic alpine skiing events.
Cross-country skier Helena Takalo
Anni Helena Takalo (née Kivioja, born 28 October 1947) is a Finnish former cross-country skier. She was born in Nivala, and was dominant women's cross-country skiing in the 1970s, earning five Winter Olympic medals and four FIS Nordic World Ski ...
contributed three of
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
's seven medals by reaching podium place finishes in all of the women's events.
Two
Dutch
Dutch commonly refers to:
* Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands
* Dutch people ()
* Dutch language ()
Dutch may also refer to:
Places
* Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States
* Pennsylvania Dutch Country
People E ...
speed skaters were responsible for five of their country's six medals:
Piet Kleine
Pieter "Piet" Kleine (born 17 September 1951) is a former speed skater from the Netherlands who specialized in the longer distances.
Short biography
At the 1976 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Piet Kleine became Olympic Champion on the 10,000  ...
won the men's 10,000 metres and came second in the 5,000 metres, while
Hans van Helden
Hans van Helden (born 27 April 1948) is a former speed skater, originally competing for the Netherlands, later for France.
Life and career
Despite being a very talented speed skater and having an excellent skating style and technique, Van Hel ...
secured bronze medals in the same events and also in the 1,500 metres. Before these Games, Great Britain's last Winter Olympic medal had been a gold at the
1964 Games, also held in Innsbruck. Twelve years later in the same city, the
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
team won again a single gold medal, this time by figure skater
John Curry
John Anthony Curry, (9 September 1949 – 15 April 1994) was a British Figure skating, figure skater. He was the 1976 1976 European Figure Skating Championships, European, Figure skating at the 1976 Winter Olympics, Olympic and World Figure Sk ...
in the men's singles with a still-standing record total score.
The two bronze medals won by
Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
athletes were not enough to prevent this team's performance from becoming the weakest ever in the nation's Winter Olympic history.
Andorra
, image_flag = Flag of Andorra.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Andorra.svg
, symbol_type = Coat of arms
, national_motto = la, Virtus Unita Fortior, label=none (Latin)"United virtue is stro ...
and
San Marino
San Marino (, ), officially the Republic of San Marino ( it, Repubblica di San Marino; ), also known as the Most Serene Republic of San Marino ( it, Serenissima Repubblica di San Marino, links=no), is the fifth-smallest country in the world an ...
sent their first delegations to the Winter Olympics,
whereas the
Republic of China
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...
competed for the second and last time before its return as
Chinese Taipei at the 1984 Winter Olympics
The Republic of China (ROC) had always competed in the Olympic Games under that name except for the second time under the name of Chinese Taipei, and the first Winter Games, at the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia. The change in name ...
; none of these teams medalled.
Medal table
The medal table is based on information provided by the
International Olympic Committee
The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...
(IOC) and is consistent with IOC convention in its published medal tables. By default, the table is ordered by the number of gold medals won by an NOC. The number of silver medals is taken into consideration next and then the number of bronze medals. If nations are still tied, equal ranking is given and they are listed alphabetically.
Change By Doping
Galina Kulakova
Galina Alexeyevna Kulakova (russian: Галина Алексеевна Кулакова, born 29 April 1942) is a Soviet former cross-country skier, arguably the best skier on distances shorter than 10 km in the early 1970s. She won four Ol ...
of the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
finished 3rd in the women's 5 km ski event, but was disqualified due to a positive test for banned substance
ephedrine
Ephedrine is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is often used to prevent low blood pressure during anesthesia. It has also been used for asthma, narcolepsy, and obesity but is not the preferred treatment. It is of unclear benefit in ...
. She claimed that this was a result of using the nasal spray that contained the substance. Both the
FIS
FIS or fis may refer to:
Science and technology
* '' Fis'', an ''E. Coli'' gene
* Fis phenomenon, a phenomenon in linguistics
* F♯ (musical note)
* Flight information service, an air traffic control service
* Frame Information Structure, a Se ...
and the
IOC
The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...
allowed her to compete in the 10 km and the 4×5 km relay.
This was the first stripped medal at the Winter Olympics.
See also
*
1976 Winter Paralympics medal table The 1976 Winter Paralympics medal table is a list of National Paralympic Committees (NPCs) ranked by the number of gold medals won by their athletes during the 1976 Winter Paralympics (the inaugural Winter Paralympic Games), held in Örnsköldsvik, ...
*
1976 Summer Olympics medal table
The 1976 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad, were a summer multi-sport event held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, from July 17 to August 1, 1976. A total of 6,084 athletes from 92 countries represented by National O ...
References
External links
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{{featured list
Medal count
1976
Events January
* January 3 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force.
* January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea.
* January 11 – The 1976 Phila ...