The Fort Worth Press - Beijing Olympics closes after sporting drama, doping and golden Gu

USD -
AED 3.673042
AFN 72.04561
ALL 90.426454
AMD 393.432155
ANG 1.790208
AOA 916.000367
ARS 1081.039361
AUD 1.654807
AWG 1.8
AZN 1.70397
BAM 1.784082
BBD 2.031653
BDT 122.253136
BGN 1.786375
BHD 0.376648
BIF 2990.649943
BMD 1
BND 1.345222
BOB 6.952794
BRL 5.844604
BSD 1.006157
BTN 85.842645
BWP 14.014139
BYN 3.292862
BYR 19600
BZD 2.021163
CAD 1.42275
CDF 2873.000362
CHF 0.861746
CLF 0.0249
CLP 955.539339
CNY 7.28155
CNH 7.295041
COP 4181.710376
CRC 509.007982
CUC 1
CUP 26.5
CVE 100.583808
CZK 23.045604
DJF 179.18358
DKK 6.808204
DOP 63.5439
DZD 133.249715
EGP 50.555986
ERN 15
ETB 132.622212
EUR 0.91245
FJD 2.314904
FKP 0.774531
GBP 0.776488
GEL 2.750391
GGP 0.774531
GHS 15.595895
GIP 0.774531
GMD 71.503851
GNF 8707.867731
GTQ 7.765564
GYD 210.508552
HKD 7.77455
HNL 25.744128
HRK 6.871704
HTG 131.657925
HUF 370.410388
IDR 16745
ILS 3.74336
IMP 0.774531
INR 85.53285
IQD 1318.129989
IRR 42100.000352
ISK 132.170386
JEP 0.774531
JMD 158.686431
JOD 0.708904
JPY 146.93504
KES 130.052452
KGS 86.768804
KHR 4028.278221
KMF 450.503794
KPW 900.000008
KRW 1459.510383
KWD 0.30779
KYD 0.838495
KZT 510.166477
LAK 21794.298746
LBP 90155.803877
LKR 298.335234
LRD 201.240593
LSL 19.187412
LTL 2.95274
LVL 0.60489
LYD 4.866591
MAD 9.582851
MDL 17.779704
MGA 4665.906499
MKD 56.132269
MMK 2099.341751
MNT 3508.091945
MOP 8.055188
MRU 40.127708
MUR 44.670378
MVR 15.403739
MWK 1744.766249
MXN 20.436704
MYR 4.437039
MZN 63.910377
NAD 19.187412
NGN 1532.820377
NIO 37.026226
NOK 10.768404
NPR 137.348233
NZD 1.787151
OMR 0.384721
PAB 1.006249
PEN 3.697332
PGK 4.15325
PHP 57.385038
PKR 282.466317
PLN 3.899545
PYG 8066.59065
QAR 3.667868
RON 4.542038
RSD 106.86431
RUB 84.834664
RWF 1450.034208
SAR 3.752488
SBD 8.316332
SCR 14.340707
SDG 600.503676
SEK 9.992304
SGD 1.345604
SHP 0.785843
SLE 22.750371
SLL 20969.501083
SOS 575.051311
SRD 36.646504
STD 20697.981008
SVC 8.804561
SYP 13001.836564
SZL 19.194527
THB 34.412038
TJS 10.95252
TMT 3.5
TND 3.081231
TOP 2.342104
TRY 37.964804
TTD 6.815964
TWD 33.177504
TZS 2691.721779
UAH 41.414641
UGX 3677.993158
UYU 42.563284
UZS 13000.684151
VES 70.161515
VND 25805
VUV 122.117516
WST 2.799576
XAF 598.364424
XAG 0.033794
XAU 0.000329
XCD 2.70255
XDR 0.744173
XOF 598.364424
XPF 108.789054
YER 245.650363
ZAR 19.12525
ZMK 9001.203587
ZMW 27.896921
ZWL 321.999592
  • SCS

    -0.0600

    10.68

    -0.56%

  • NGG

    -3.4600

    65.93

    -5.25%

  • AZN

    -5.4600

    68.46

    -7.98%

  • BTI

    -2.0600

    39.86

    -5.17%

  • BCC

    0.8100

    95.44

    +0.85%

  • RBGPF

    69.0200

    69.02

    +100%

  • GSK

    -2.4800

    36.53

    -6.79%

  • CMSC

    0.0300

    22.29

    +0.13%

  • JRI

    -0.8600

    11.96

    -7.19%

  • RIO

    -3.7600

    54.67

    -6.88%

  • BCE

    0.0500

    22.71

    +0.22%

  • BP

    -2.9600

    28.38

    -10.43%

  • VOD

    -0.8700

    8.5

    -10.24%

  • RELX

    -3.2800

    48.16

    -6.81%

  • RYCEF

    -1.5500

    8.25

    -18.79%

  • CMSD

    0.1600

    22.83

    +0.7%

Beijing Olympics closes after sporting drama, doping and golden Gu
Beijing Olympics closes after sporting drama, doping and golden Gu

Beijing Olympics closes after sporting drama, doping and golden Gu

A Beijing Winter Olympics which saw sporting drama and milestones but was tarnished by a Russian doping scandal ended on Sunday with an uplifting closing ceremony.

Text size:

The Games will be remembered for new stars such as Eileen Gu but also for the doping controversy which engulfed 15-year-old figure skater Kamila Valieva and because they took place inside a vast Covid-secure "bubble".

The "Bird's Nest" stadium, which also took centre stage when Beijing hosted the 2008 Summer Games, was the scene for a celebratory, snowflake-themed closing ceremony attended by President Xi Jinping and a socially distanced crowd seated among red lanterns.

Declaring the Games closed and handing over to 2026 hosts Milano-Cortina, International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach hailed an "unforgettable Olympic experience".

There was no feared mass outbreak of Covid at the Games or in the wider community in the Chinese capital, but Bach said: "If we want to finally overcome this pandemic, we must be faster, we must aim higher, we must be stronger -- we must stand together.

"In this Olympic spirit of solidarity, we call on the international community: give equal access to vaccines for everybody around the world."

Fireworks lit up the night sky as the ceremony reached its crescendo, spelling out the words "ONE WORLD".

- Doping overshadows Games -

Since the opening ceremony on February 4, a new global star emerged in the form of 18-year-old freestyle skier Gu, who was born in California but switched to China in 2019 and became the unofficial face of the Games.

There was a new men's figure skating champion in 22-year-old Nathan Chen of the United States, who dethroned two-time Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu, in what could be the Japanese legend's final appearance at a Games.

Another iconic figure of winter sports, the American snowboarder Shaun White, will definitely not return to competition of any sort after calling it quits.

The 35-year-old's last event ended agonisingly out of the medals and he was in tears as he bid farewell to snowboarding -- "the love of my life".

There was bitter disappointment for his fellow American, the alpine ski star Mikaela Shiffrin, one of the biggest names at the Games but who went home without a medal.

There were tears from Valieva after it emerged that she had failed a drugs test prior to the Games, catapulting her to the forefront of yet another Russian doping controversy to mar an Olympics and piling intense pressure on the teenager.

In what will go down as a notorious episode in the history of the Winter Olympics, the pre-tournament favourite for singles gold fell several times on the ice in the finals, to audible gasps from the socially distanced crowd of hand-picked spectators.

Her doping case looks certain to drag on in the coming months, long after the Games have packed up. She was allowed to skate in the Chinese capital but has not been cleared of doping.

In a Games first, the skating team medals were not awarded after Valieva played a starring role in propelling the Russians to gold, ahead of the United States and Japan.

The American skaters made an 11th-hour court bid on Saturday to get their hands on their medals before they went home, but the Court of Arbitration for Sport rejected it.

- Milestones -

China and its ruling Communist Party will look back on a soft-power success.

Fears about a mass Covid outbreak in the "closed loop" bubble sealing the nearly 3,000 athletes and about 65,000 others never materialised.

Some athletes did though catch the illness and the pandemic was never far away -- Russia and Canada's women ice hockey teams played each other wearing medical masks after the results of their daily PCR tests failed to arrive in time.

Concerns about human rights had dominated the build-up, with the United States leading a diplomatic boycott by its closest allies over China's rights record, especially the fate of the Muslim Uyghur minority in Xinjiang. Their athletes did however compete.

China warned in the fraught lead-up that foreign athletes criticising the authorities could face consequences, but in the end, any protests against the hosts were extremely muted.

There were numerous records -- among them American bobsleigher Elana Meyers Taylor becoming the most decorated Black athlete in the history of the Winter Olympics.

Snowboarder Zoi Sadowski Synnott made history for New Zealand, winning her country's first Winter Games gold; with Gu pocketing two golds, the hosts enjoyed a significant medal bump and finished third in the medals table with nine golds.

That was easily their best performance in the Winter Games, a place ahead of chief geopolitical rival the United States, on eight golds.

For the second Games in a row, Norway topped the medals table, with 16 golds. Germany were second on 12.

P.McDonald--TFWP