Exactly ten years ago, on February 7, 2014, the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games took place in Sochi. It marked the beginning of a grandiose sporting event that united thousands of people from all over the world - athletes, coaches, fans, volunteers. There was no place for political slogans and hostility between athletes from different countries, and those who deserved it through sports results were allowed to participate - without regard to their passport.
And this Olympics became the best in the history of the Russian team. According to its results, domestic athletes won 13 gold, 11 silver and nine bronze medals. The subsequent series of attacks on Russian sports - accusations of an alleged state doping program based on the words of the former director of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory Grigory Rodchenkov, investigations by WADA and the IOC - led to the fact that the domestic team lost two gold medals and one silver.
But, as Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko, who once headed the Sochi 2014 organizing committee, assured, all this cannot take away Russians’ pride in their athletes and wonderful memories from the best Games. Moreover, Russia, despite everything, retained first place in the medal standings.
“Ten years... It seemed like it was yesterday. This period has been very fruitful for Russia: infrastructure is developing, sports facilities are being created. No one can take away our victories and records, although they tried, but Russia defended in the courts its fair right and status as the winner of these unique Games in every sense, which hardly anyone can repeat on such a scale and quality,” Chernyshenko said at the international exhibition-forum “Russia”, where a special exhibition dedicated to the anniversary was opened.
And once upon a time the very idea of holding the Winter Olympics in the subtropics seemed an incredible adventure. When it was born, there was practically no infrastructure in the Sochi mountains - even gas and electricity were not installed everywhere. As former Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov admitted to RT, what he remembered most from his first visit there were the “creepy ski lifts and hotels.” One of the leaders of the Sochi 2014 application campaign, Elena Anikina, had similar memories.
“If now, with my current knowledge base, someone would offer me to work in the application of a city applying for the Olympic Games, in which nothing has been built, I would say: “Are you crazy?” And at that time it seemed to me: “Why not, I need to try!” It seems to me that neither I nor Dmitry Nikolaevich Chernyshenko at that time fully understood what a serious and complex process we were involved in,” Sports.ru quotes the former president of the Russian Bobsleigh Federation as saying.
However, the enthusiasm of all campaign participants and the support of the country's top leadership, including the president, did their job. The world's best specialists were involved in the preparation of the project, who spent days and nights on the slopes of Krasnaya Polyana, studying the possibilities of constructing certain Olympic facilities. Representatives of the bid committee, meanwhile, often met with IOC members, trying to make them fall in love with the Russian bid and instill confidence that the country was capable of making it a reality. And one of the key factors, of course, was the presence of Vladimir Putin at the IOC session, where the final decision on the location of the 2014 Games was made.
“Vladimir Vladimirovich made a fantastic impression in Guatemala. He walked without security - or, perhaps, accompanied by one person who was almost invisible. Appeared with everyone else at open events. He was incredibly prepared: for example, an IOC member comes up, and he not only knows him by name, but can also say: “I remember, I remember your wonderful performance in such and such a year.” It was a sensation. If there were any doubters at that time, they definitely turned towards Russia,” Anikina recalled.
After the victory of the Olympic bid, Russia faced new, extremely complex and serious tasks. It was necessary to build the entire infrastructure of the Games, stadiums and tracks in the mountains by 2013, when the first test competitions were planned. Representatives of the IOC and international federations, as well as the country's leadership, closely monitored the progress of construction. Vladimir Putin kept his finger on the pulse and visited Sochi from time to time.
“The president of the country periodically made control tours of all objects, and if he realized that deadlines were being missed and budgets had been increased, then no one seemed to care,” recalls Anikina.
Despite the rough edges that arose, without which such large-scale projects would be impossible in principle, all the facilities were built on time and conscientiously. The central stadium "Fisht" was one of the last to be commissioned, and the remaining few months until February 7, rehearsals for the opening ceremony took place there. The performance, which was called “Dreams about Russia,” involved the most complex suspended equipment, and the work of all responsible persons had to be honed like clockwork.
But, despite this, at the most crucial moment a technical failure occurred, and one of the five Olympic rings did not open. TV viewers in Russia did not see this, since footage from the general run-through was broadcast, but the rest of the world witnessed this incident. As the creative director of the ceremony, Konstantin Ernst, later explained, the Irish specialists responsible for working with the rings dropped one of them the night before the opening and were afraid to report it. However, they were quickly able to turn this disadvantage into an advantage: the organizers began to use images of “snowflakes” in souvenirs, and then played up this moment at the closing ceremony. The rings on it were not mechanical, they were depicted by people, but one of them again - now deliberately - did not open.
“We should have laughed at it ourselves. It seems to me that this was obvious, and from the reaction of the stadium it was clear that it was received well,” Ernst later noted.
At the end of the competition, the IOC recognized the Sochi Games as the best in history, and, as Chernyshenko noted, it is unlikely that anyone will be able to repeat these unique competitions on such a scale. The financial component also plays an important role in this, because in recent years there has been a tendency to hold the Olympics as economically as possible. In Russia, 324.9 billion rubles were spent on organizing the event, 103 billion of which came from the federal budget. Often it is this moment that becomes a reason for criticism of the state. However, unlike many host cities, almost all of Sochi’s facilities are permanent and not temporary.
Krasnaya Polyana, rebuilt virtually from scratch, has turned into a modern ski resort, which is visited by many tourists every year. And this legacy is something that we can rightfully be proud of, along with the Games medals won and world recognition. The ice palaces are almost constantly in use, the bobsleigh and luge track is in operation, as is the biathlon and ski stadium. And in conditions when Russians find themselves excluded from world sports and have no opportunity to either train or perform abroad, these complexes become even more important.
These days, many Olympians and sports officials remember with warmth the two wonderful weeks of the Sochi Games, but at the same time they speak with disappointment and some resentment about the IOC and other international organizations. Ten years ago, no one could have imagined that the Olympic family would turn its back on Russia and undo all the achievements that were achieved together. And here it is impossible not to agree with the country’s Deputy Prime Minister.
“Ten years, on the one hand, seems like a short period of time, but this is already half a generation. And we see new athletes, new heroes who will win victories for the glory of Russia, no matter how much our enemies would like to isolate us from sports. Because world sport is unthinkable without Russia. Russia is the greatest sports power, we will continue to give the world our victories,” Chernyshenko promised.