The Games opened in Milan, Cortina, and elsewhere with media spectacle and early success for Canada
The 2026 Milano-Cortina Olympic Winter Games officially began on Friday, Feb. 6 amid controversy and heavy media attention for the sporting event. The Opening Ceremonies, themed on international calls for unity, were broadcast live from Milan, Cortina, Livigno, and Predazzo, all located in Northern Italy. The Games has been met with its fair share of controversies, as well as some early wins for Canada.
The call for unity between countries, one of the foundational principles of the Olympics, comes at a contentious time. Protests erupted in Milan on Feb. 6 against the presence of ICE agents at the Games as part of the U.S. security detail. While the U.S. security detail for government officials at past Olympics has often included ICE agents, the recent killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by ICE agents have led to outrage around the world and backlash over their role at the Games. In an interview with a local radio station, Milan mayor Giuseppe Sala called ICE “a militia that kills,” saying “it is clear they are not welcome in Milan.” Protests grew around Italy over the weekend over the environmental impact of the Games and cost of living crisis in the country, among other issues. On Feb. 7, Italian police fired tear gas at protestors near the Santagiulia Arena, home to this year’s hockey competition.
During the Opening Ceremonies, audience members booed U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance, who was at the Games with his wife Usha Vance. Many viewers watching the event on the U.S. channel NBC did not notice the reaction, compared to those watching the CBC’s broadcast, where the sound was more and audible, and one CBC anchor said “those are a lot of boos for” Vance. NBC has denied purposely editing the audio.
Speed skater Valérie Maltais of La Baie, Quebec, won Canada’s first medal of the games on Feb. 7, placing third in the women’s 3000 metre long-track race. Canada has now medalled five times in this event throughout Olympic history; all of them bronze. Two other short-track speed skaters, Courtney Sarault and Rikki Doak, are the only athletes representing New Brunswick at this year’s Games, hailing from Moncton and Fredericton, respectively.
Also on Feb. 7, Canada’s women’s hockey team beat Switzerland 4-0 in an unexpected first match-up of the Games; multiple cases of norovirus among the Finnish team delayed the scheduled Feb. 5 Canada-Finland game a week.
The morning of Feb. 9, Ontario’s Megan Oldham took the bronze medal in women’s slopestyle, finishing behind China’s Eileen Gu and Switzerland’s Mathilde Gremaud.
Figure skater and McMaster University student Madeline Schizas gained online attention this week for requesting an extension on a sociology assignment due to being in the Olympics. In a much-seen social media post, Schizas shared an email to her professor, writing “I was competing in the Olympic Games yesterday and thought the reflection was due Sunday, not Friday.” She was ultimately granted the extension.
The theme of the games is “Armonia,” meaning harmony in Italian, while the Opening Ceremonies focused on international peace. Actress and UN peace ambassador Charlize Theron made an appearance, quoting fellow South African, and her “beloved countryman,” Nelson Mandela’s description of peace as “the creation of an environment where all can flourish.” The Olympic flag was carried in by four Olympians and four figures selected based on advocacy for world peace, including two-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee Nicolò Govoni and UN Global Advocate for Peace Maryam Bukar Hassan.
Since their revival in 1896, however, the Olympics have always been politically charged. At the height of the Cold War, the United States, joined by dozens of other countries, including Canada, boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics in response to the Soviet Union’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan. More recently, Canada launched a diplomatic boycott against the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing; while athletes travelled to China, Canadian officials stayed home.
The future of the Winter Olympics was also up in the air this week: speaking to reporters on Feb. 4, Karl Stoss, head of the IOC Olympic Programme Working Group, said, “maybe we are also discussing to bring the Winter Olympics a little bit earlier.” The proposal would move the Olympics from February to January to get more snow and avoid the impacts of climate change, particularly on the Paralympics. “The Paralympics are now in March, and this is very late because the sun is strong enough to melt the snow,” said Stoss. Another consideration is to broaden the scope of the Winter Olympics, adding traditional summer events like running and cycling. Whether these changes are made in time for the next Winter Olympic Games, in the French Alps in 2030, remains to be seen.