XV Olympic Winter Games

)
, nations = 57
, athletes = 1,423 (1,122 men, 301 women)
, events = 46 in 6 sports (10 disciplines)
, opening = February 13, 1988
, closing = February 28, 1988
, opened_by = Governor General Jeanne Sauvé
, cauldron = Robyn Perry
, stadium = McMahon Stadium
, winter_prev = Sarajevo 1984
, winter_next = Albertville 1992
, summer_prev = Los Angeles 1984
, summer_next = Seoul 1988

The 1988 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XV Olympic Winter Games (french: XV^es Jeux olympiques d'hiver) and commonly known as Calgary 1988 ( bla, Mohkínsstsisi 1988; sto, Wîchîspa Oyade 1988 or ; cr, Otôskwanihk 1998/; srs, Guts’ists’i 1988; kut, ʔaknuqtapȼik’ 1988; den, Klincho-tinay-indihay 1988), was a multi-sport event held from February 13 to 28, 1988, in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. It was the first Winter Olympic Games to be held for 15 days, like the counterpart Summer Olympic Games. The majority of the contested events took place in Calgary itself. However, the skiing events were held west of the city at the Nakiska ski resort in Kananaskis Country and the Canmore Nordic Centre Provincial Park in the town of Canmore.

In 1988, a record 57 National Olympic Committees (NOC) sent a total of 1,423 athletes to these Games. These Winter Olympics would be the last attended one for both the Soviet Union and East Germany NOCs. Just like the 1976 Summer Olympics, Canada failed again to win a gold medal in an official medal event on home soil. The Finnish ski jumper, Matti Nykänen, and the Dutch speed skater, Yvonne van Gennip, won three individual gold medals each. The 1988 Winter Olympics were also remembered for the "heroic failure" of both the British ski jumper, Michael Edwards, and the debut of the Jamaica national bobsleigh team. Both of them became subjects of major feature films about their participation in these Games: ''Cool Runnings'' by Disney in 1993 and ''Eddie the Eagle'' by 20th Century Studios in 2016.

At approximately C$829 million, the Calgary Games were one of the most expensive Olympics ever held at the time. The facilities that were built for these Winter Olympics helped the Calgary region turn into the heart of Canada's elite winter sports program, under the tutelage of WinSport. The five purpose-built venues for those Games continued to be used mostly for training and hosting various winter sporting events every year. These experiences helped Canada develop into one of the top nations in Winter Olympics competition. The climax of this effort was the overall first-place finish at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Host city selection

Calgary's bid for the 1988 Winter Olympic Games was Canada's seventh and Calgary's fourth attempt at hosting the Winter Games. The first Canadian bid for Winter Games belonged to Montreal in 1956, while Vancouver bid for both the 1976 and 1980 Games, while Calgary (and neighbouring Banff) under the Calgary Olympic Development Association (CODA) submitted bids for the 1964, 1968, and 1972 Winter Games. CODA was laid dormant in 1966, after losing three consecutive bids in a row. However, CODA was later revived in 1978, when Frank King and Bob Niven of Calgary's Booster Club took over the organization's leadership. King and Niven brought some members from previous bids back including former Olympic Sprinter and CODA founder Ernie McCullough, and politician Arthur Ryan Smith to consult on the project.

In October 1979, CODA was able to secure the Canadian Olympic Association's (COA) support as Canada's official bid for the 1988 Winter Olympics over a competing bid by Vancouver by a vote of 27–9. Calgary's bid was bold because no one infrastructure existed there and everything would have to be built from scratch. CODA proposed constructing all new venues to overcome the city's lack of winter sports facilities with the argument that Canada's inventory of training facilities would grow significantly if Calgary was awarded the Games. The defeated Vancouver organizing group lamented that they lost to Calgary's "Big-ticket Games" idea, which was estimated to cost nearly three times what Vancouver was expected to pay to host the Winter Olympics. Vancouver's bid was based on already developed infrastructure, including the Pacific Coliseum and Whistler Blackcomb that would again serve as the basis for bids for the successful 2010 Winter Olympics bid and later the 2030 Winter Olympics Next, CODA spent two years building local support for the megaproject, selling memberships to approximately 80,000 of Calgary's 600,000 residents. Calgary had further secured million in funding from the federal ( million) and Alberta's governments while some civic leaders, including then-mayor Ralph Klein, crisscrossed the world to favour IOC delegates. Driven by the arrival of the National Hockey League's (NHL) newly renamed Calgary Flames from Atlanta in 1980, the city had already begun constructing a new NHL arena that would be later named the Olympic Saddledome. That course of action demonstrated to the IOC Calgary's determination in wanting to host the Winter Olympics.

The Olympic bid itself emphasized the cultural and natural beauty of Calgary, Alberta and surrounding areas, as a perfect asset for hosting the Winter Olympics. The city was marketed as a capitalist, oil-driven, and modern economy that also had mountain playgrounds, extensive wilderness, and rodeo culture. The two seemingly contradictory images were brought together, as part of an extensive and diverse lobbying program.

Calgary was one of three cities and towns that bid officially for the 1988 Winter Olympics. The other two were Falun, Sweden, and Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy. The Italian town (comune) had before hosted the 1956 Winter Olympics. The vote was held on September 30, 1981, in Baden-Baden, West Germany, during the 84th IOC Session and 11th Olympic Congress. After Cortina d'Ampezzo was eliminated in the first round of balloting, Calgary won in the second and final round of balloting over Falun, by a margin of 17 votes. The announcement of CODA's victory sent the delegates in Baden-Baden and Calgary residents into singing and dancing. It also made then Alberta premier, Peter Lougheed, burst openly into tears in front of the cameras. Later, Ralph Klein sang a rendition of Mac Davis' '' It's Hard to Be Humble''. It was the first Winter Olympics awarded to Canada and the second Olympic Games overall, following the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. Cortina d'Ampezzo, along with Milan, would get to host the 2026 Winter Olympics. The town will be the fourth to host the Winter Olympics twice, along with St. Moritz (1928 and 1948), Lake Placid (1932 and 1980), and Innsbruck (1964 and 1976).

Olympic historians, John E. Findling and Kimberly D. Pelle noted that once the Games were awarded to Calgary, the cultural and community aspects of the bid were pushed aside by the newly formed Calgary Olympic organizing committee called the ''Olympiques Calgary Olympics '88'' (OCO'88). It then proceeded to take on a "vigorous, resilient, and impersonal corporate business strategy" toward the planning and operation of the Games.

Venues

Bill Pratt was a former general contractor who took over as OCO'88 president in 1983. He was the main manager that oversaw the construction of the Olympic megaproject. Donald Jacques, a former general manager of the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede, once said, "Because of him, everything was built on time and on budget." However, Bill Pratt was controversial by rubbing many of his colleagues the wrong way. One former co-worker once predicted back in 1983: "He will get everything built. There may not be many (of us) left around to enjoy it, but he'll get it done." His relations with the news media were also strained at times. He had barely settled into his new position when the Calgary press media began criticizing OCO'88 for excessive secrecy and for awarding Olympic contracts to Calgary's PR firm Francis Williams and Johnson Ltd. Pratt was a director of that firm, before accepting the organizing committee job. OCO'88 had insisted that there was no conflict of interest involved in the whole process. Therefore, Pratt declared: "I have been nailed for a lot, but that does not bother me. The record stands". After the 1988 Winter Olympics bid was won in 1981, OCO'88 made a new technical assessment and had to re-plan all the originally proposed competition venues except for the few that already existed and were within the campus of the University of Calgary.

McMahon Stadium, the primary outdoor facility used mainly by the Canadian Football League's (CFL) Calgary Stampeders and inside of the University of Calgary and had originally been chosen to host only the opening ceremonies and the Saddledome was chosen to be the place of the closing ceremonies. But due to the huge demand for tickets, the Organizing Committee decided to move the closing ceremony to the Stadium which held twice the capacity of the Saddledome. The last time that the two Winter Olympic ceremonies were held at the same venue was at the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, California.

The 1988 Winter Olympics' five main all-purpose venues were created at a significant cost at that time. Three of them are located within Calgary and the other two are located west of the city. First, the Olympic Saddledome was the venue for the men's ice hockey final and the figure skating finals. It is located at Stampede Park and this facility was expected to cost C$83 million, but a cost overrun pushed it to nearly C$100 million. Second, the Olympic Oval was built on the campus of the University of Calgary for C$40 million. It was the first fully enclosed 400-metre long track speed skating in the world, to protect the athletes from bitterly cold weather and the Chinook winds. Third, Canada Olympic Park (formerly called the ''Paskapoo Ski Hill'') was renovated for C$200 million and is located on the western outskirts of Calgary. This most expensive venue of these Winter Olympics hosted the men's bobsleigh, luge, and men's ski jumping and its portion of the Nordic combined events. Also, it hosted some events of the demonstration sport of freestyle skiing.

From the west of Calgary, the other two main all-purpose venues were built at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. First, the Canmore Nordic Centre was 90% funded by the province of Alberta, for C$17.3 million. It is located beside the town of Canmore and it hosted cross-country skiing, plus its men's portion of the Nordic combined, and the men's biathlon events. After the Games were over, there was the intention that it would become a year-round destination for Albertans, by facilitating Canmore's economic transition away from coal mining to tourist attractions. However, the Nakiska (''Cree'' meaning "to meet") ski resort was the most controversial venue built for these Winter Olympics. It is located on Mount Allan (inside Kananaskis Country) and it hosted the alpine skiing events for C$25 million by the Alberta government. The venue site drew criticism because of the various environmental concerns, the building of adequate ski slopes, and the need to use artificial snow, a result of the lower snow quantity that fell that season. Also, the International Ski Federation (FIS) officials noted the venue's lack of technical difficulties needed for the Olympic competition. Therefore, these FIS officials proposed some major changes in the paths and that caused great and greater difficulties. These modifications were met with praise from Olympic alpine skiing competitors. Like at Canada Olympic Park, this venue also hosted some freestyle skiing events as a demonstration sport.

Three other existing facilities served as secondary competition venues for the Games. The first one, was the Max Bell Centre hosted the demonstration sports of curling and short track speed skating. The Father David Bauer Olympic Arena and the Stampede Corral shared the functions of secondary venues for the ice hockey tournament and the figure skating preliminaries. Though the Stampede Corral did not support the International Ice Hockey Federation's (IIHF) standard-sized Olympic ice surface, OCO'88 was able to convince the IIHF to sanction the ice rink for Olympic competition, in exchange for a C$1.2 million payment.

Participating National Olympic Committees

A record 57 National Olympic Committees (NOCs) entered athletes at the 1988 Winter Olympics, with eight more NOCs than any other previous Olympic Winter Games. 1,122 men and 301 women, for a total of 1,423 athletes, participated in these Games. Fiji, Guam, Guatemala, Jamaica, the Netherlands Antilles and the Virgin Islands had their Winter Olympics debut in 1988.

Sports

There were 46 events contested in 6 sports (10 disciplines). In addition, there were 4 demonstration disciplines that have no official status in the overall medal tally.

Calendar

:''All dates are in Mountain Time Zone ( UTC-7)''

Weather conditions

The weather conditions were a problem facing OCO'88 during the Games, with temperatures ranging from -28° to +22° Celsius. After an unexpectedly freezing opening ceremony, the outdoor competitions scheduled to start the next day had to be postponed. This ended up affecting the men's downhill skiing event at Nakiska which was postponed for one day, due to Chinook winds blowing up to 160 km/h. The women's downhill event also experienced the same scenario. With the ski jumping venue facing north at Canada Olympic Park (COP), the same winds also disrupted those events, with the large hill event being postponed four times. It also disrupted the Nordic combined events, in which the ski jumping part had to be postponed as well. This situation ended up causing something unprecedented in the history of the Winter Olympics, as for the first time both the ski jumping and Nordic combined cross-country skiing events were contested in a single day. Despite using artificial cooling, the bobsleigh and luge events did not need to be rescheduled; however, several races had to be postponed because of the high temperatures recorded and also because of the dirt that was carried away by these winds.

Preparations

Olympic organizing committee (OCO'88)

The Calgary Olympic Development Association (CODA) Board of Directors had originally 25 members. It was chaired by Frank King, followed by former Mayors Ralph Klein and Ross Alger, and other prominent Calgarians. The executive committee president was Robert Niven. The Olympic Organizing Committee (OOC) was formed by utilizing many of the original board of directors members. It was initially started with 11 members and was grown to 25 members by October 1983. It grew further to 29 members by 1985, when former Alberta premier, Peter Lougheed, was added to the list. An Olympic biographer, Kevin Wamsley, noted that the CEO Frank King, President Bill Pratt, Ralph Klein, and former COA President Roger Jackson had collectively the most influence on all aspects of these Winter Olympics. This organizing committee took a hierarchical form for planning these Olympics, which caused consternation from some staff, volunteers, and people in executive roles. The original staff, who were at odds with the current management structure, were either fired or willingly resigned. Also, there were claims that some of the volunteers were verbally abused. As a result, David Leighton resigned as OOC President in 1982, after only five months on the job. Therefore, Bill Pratt, a former general manager of the Calgary Stampede, became the new OCOG's president shortly afterwards. The City of Calgary and the Canadian Olympic Association (COA) delegated officially all Olympic responsibilities, including staging the Winter Olympics under the Olympic Charter, to the newly formed OCO'88 in February and September 1983 respectively.

However, conflicts within OCO'88 grew in the public eye and a review of the entire management structure was conducted after Ralph Klein threatened it with a public inquiry in 1986. Thus, Frank King remained as CEO, but with the addition of more full-time staff. Also, more than 9,000 volunteers were registered who were allocated to the most diverse areas. Despite these changes, there was still some animosity within OCO'88. Kevin Walmsley noted that Bill Pratt and Frank King continued to have a very tense relationship and that any movement caused sparks with each other. Some members of the media commented that the changes made further alienated the general public, with a host broadcaster producer, Ralph Mellanby, describing it as "an oilman's and cattleman's Calgary thing." Long-time IOC member Dick Pound, on behalf of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), went on record to say that the IOC grew increasingly frustrated, as it saw the actions of OCO'88 as a refusal to collaborate with them.

Television

The 1988 Winter Olympic Games coincided with a shift in television policy by the International Olympic Committee and growing enthusiasm by broadcasters in the United States. Amendments to the ''Olympic Charter'' in 1977 established a policy mandating joint television rights involving the IOC and the local organizing committee and was enshrined in the 1981 bid agreement for the Calgary games.

The joint negotiating committee convened in 1984 late-January, some weeks before the Sarajevo 1984 Winter Games at the IOC's president residency at the Lausanne Palace were held to negotiate the Calgary television contracts with American broadcasters. The negotiating committee was represented by Dick Pound for the IOC, Bill Wardle for OCO'88 and consultant Barry Frank. The co-negotiating committee designed a new tender process for the television rights bid with an emphasis on creating a level playing field for all broadcasters. For the first time, the negotiations were based on a series of sealed bids and representatives from ABC, CBS and NBC vied for the opportunity to broadcast the Games.

After six rounds of sealed bids, the ABC delegation led by producer Roone Arledge was successful with an agreement paying a record million ( million Canadian at the time) in exchange for exclusive rights for the games. CBS exited the bidding process after the second round with a final offer of $257 million, while ABC and NBC both reached the fifth round with an offer of $300 million. In the sixth and final stage, the IOC and OCO'88 decided a coin flip would determine which of ABC or NBC had the right to submit the first bid or defer, a decision neither network supported. NBC's president of sports Arthur A. Watson elected to call the coin-flip, although he remained silent on the first flip, so a second coinflip was required, and NBC won with a choice of "heads", and after 30 minutes of deliberation submitted a $304 million bid. ABC's representative Arledge made a quick phone call to executive Fred Pierce, and ABC submitted a $309 million bid, exceeding NBC's bid by $5 million. ABC's record-setting bid was immediately controversial, first Arledge had exceeded the maximum allowable bid set by ABC's executives by $34 million, and in the coming weeks ABC's coverage of the 1984 Winter Olympics which cost $91.5 million returned poor Nielsen ratings. Early estimates speculated the network would lose $50-$60 million televising the games. The ''Wall Street Journal'' described the NBC agreement as the "biggest prize of the Winter Olympics". The deal which was at the time the highest amount ever paid for a sporting event, allowed OCO'88 to announce the Games would be debt-free.

The negotiations with American television broadcasters were in sharp contrast to negotiations for Western European rights with the European Broadcasting Union quickly closing an exclusive deal with the IOC for million led by Juan Antonio Samaranch and Marc Hodler on behalf of the IOC. The ''Calgary Herald'' headline after the announcement negatively reflected on the "bargain" the European network received, and OCO'88 chairman Frank King publicly expressed his disappointment with the IOC. Samaranch's argument for providing for a privileged negotiation with EBU was ensuring European viewers had equal access and coverage of the games, something he did not believe would occur if private networks from each nation were provided with the opportunity to bid. Dick Pound was also critical of the decision and argued more revenue could be brought in from BBC and RAI alone and the privileged status suppressed the willingness of the EBU to make a market-value bid on the games.

The CTV Television Network won the bid to broadcast the Games in Canada in December 1983, paying million for the exclusive rights. CTV also won the $23.5 million contract to serve as the host broadcaster, responsible for the manpower and equipment to televise the games. In 1978, while the bid was strengthened, CBC and CTV signed an agreement that if Calgary were the eventual winner, the two broadcasters would create a consortium in which the purchase of television rights would take place jointly. The previous arrangement had CBC provide full coverage for Summer Games with CTV broadcasting a nightly summary, while CTV had the rights to Winter Games with CBC broadcasting a nightly summary. The nightly summary of the Games was also televised on CBC.

The Asian broadcast rights were awarded to NHK in July 1986 for million.

OCO'88 made several alterations to the Olympic program as part of efforts to ensure value for its broadcast partners. Now, the premier and main events, including ice hockey and figure skating, were scheduled for prime time and the Games were lengthened to 15 days from the previous 12 to ensure three weekends of coverage. However, a significant downturn in advertising revenue for sporting events resulted in ABC forecasting significant financial losses on the Games. Calgary organizers appreciated their fortunate timing in signing the deal. King described the timing of the contract with ABC as "the passing of the sun and the moon at the right time for Calgary". The revenue growth from broadcasting was significant for the Calgary Games, the 1980 Lake Placid Games generated million, while OCO'88 generated $324.9 million in broadcast rights. ABC had net losses of more than $60 million, and broadcast rights to the 1992 Winter Olympics were later sold to the CBS network for $243 million, a 20 per cent reduction compared to Calgary.

Ticketing controversies

A series of ticket-related scandals plagued the organizing committee as the Games approached, resulting in widespread public anger. Demand for tickets was high, particularly for the main events which had sold out a year in advance. Residents had been promised that only 10 per cent of tickets would go to "Olympic insiders", IOC officials and sponsors, but OCO'88 was later forced to admit that up to 50 percent of seats to top events had gone to insiders. The organizing committee, which was subsequently chastised by mayor Klein for running a "closed shop", admitted that it had failed to properly communicate the obligations it had to supply IOC officials and sponsors with priority tickets.

These events were preceded by the ticketing manager for OCO'88 being charged with theft and fraud after he sent modified ticket request forms to Americans that asked them to pay in United States funds rather than Canadian and to return them to his company's post office box rather than the office of the organizing committee. At that time, the American dollar was trading 40 cents higher than the Canadian dollar, resulting in significantly higher than anticipated revenue through currency conversion. The ticket manager maintained his innocence claiming he was used as a scapegoat and sponsor credit card Visa was responsible for the error, despite his claims, the ticketing manager was convicted of fraud, theft, and forgery, and sentenced to 5 years in prison.

Organizers attempted to respond to public concern by asking sponsors to consider reducing their orders and by paying $1.5 million to add 2,600 seats to the Saddledome, as well as increase capacity for ski jumping, alpine skiing and the opening ceremonies. This led to a change of the venue of the closing ceremonies from Saddledome to McMahon Stadium, as the stadium capacity was about two times bigger than the indoor venue. King also noted that the Calgary Games offered a then-record 1.9 million tickets for sale, three times the amount available at Sarajevo or Lake Placid and that 79 percent of them were to be allocated to Calgarians. By the start of the 1988 Winter Games, a record of over 1.4 million tickets had been sold, a figure that eclipsed the previous three Winter Games combined. In the OCO'88's final report, the Committee admits the culmination of fraud charges, a large portion of premier tickets requested by Olympic insiders, and poor communications led to a negative public reaction to the ticketing process.

For the first time in the history of the Olympics, both summer and winter, the Organizing Committee worked with a refund policy for returned or unused tickets. When an event was postponed by at least 24 hours, the ticketholder was eligible for a refund. Due to weather issues, the 8 events that were scheduled for the first 24 hours had to be rescheduled, resulting in 130,000 ticket refunds totalling million, with transactions handled by the Royal Bank of Canada.

Community

The city of Calgary is world-renowned for the enthusiasm of its population for volunteer work which is reflected in the annual Calgary Stampede, which also relied heavily on volunteers to run the Olympics. Over 22,000 people signed up for more than 9,400 positions, no matter how inglorious: doctors, lawyers and executives even offered to collect the waste generated during the opening ceremony. Also, for the first time, a "Homestay" program was created and several local families opened their homes to visitors from around the world, and others were renting their rooms or houses to those who could not stay in pay a reserve in a hotel.

Klein was among those who felt it necessary that the event be community driven, a decision which allowed the city's welcoming spirit to manifest. The Games' mascots, Hidy and Howdy, were designed to evoke images of "western hospitality". The smiling, cowboy-themed polar bears were popular across Canada. Played by a team of 150 students from Bishop Carroll High School, the sister-brother pair made up to 300 appearances per month in the lead-up to the Games. From their introduction at the closing ceremonies of the Sarajevo Games in 1984 until their retirement at the conclusion of the Calgary Games, the pair made about 50,000 appearances. The iconic mascots graced signs welcoming travellers to Calgary for nearly two decades until they were replaced in 2007. The mascot's names "Hidy" and "Howdy" were chosen by a public contest.

Finances

The 1988 Winter Olympic Games were the most expensive Games, summer or winter, to be held at that time, with total expenses exceeding million. The high cost was anticipated, as organizers were aware at the outset of their bid that most facilities would have to be constructed. The venues, constructed primarily with public money, were designed to have lasting use beyond the Games and were planned to become the home of several of Canada's national winter sports teams. The record-breaking cost of the Calgary Olympics came in stark contrast to the original projections during the 1981 bid, which estimated a total cost of million, split between million in capital costs and million in operating costs. The significant growth in capital expenditures came despite the three levels of government taking over projects which constituted nearly half of the original budgeted capital projects.

The primary source of revenue for OCO'88 was the lucrative television contracts, bringing in million (58.3 per cent of revenue), followed by corporate sponsorships at million (15.8 per cent of revenue), and ticket sales of million (7.5 per cent of revenue). Of the total expenses for the Games ( million), the Government of Canada contributed million (22.7 per cent), the Government of Alberta contributed million (14.8 per cent), and the City of Calgary contributed million (4.9 per cent). The million of government capital contributions not directly included in OCO'88's revenue statements included the Government of Canada constructing the million Canada Olympic Park, and million for the Olympic Oval

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