The 4th Winter Youth Olympic Games will open on January 19, 2024 with Opening Ceremonies set to take place across two venues within Gangwon Province, South Korea. It will be the first Winter Youth Olympic Games ever held outside of Europe and Asia’s first time hosting these Games. Previous Winter Youth Olympic Games were held in Austria in 2012, Norway in 2016, and Switzerland in 2020.
The city of PyeongChang in the mountains of Gangwon Province will serve as the location for competitions of outdoor sports including biathlon, cross-country skiing, ski jumping, and Nordic combined, in addition to the three sliding sports of skeleton, luge, and bobsledding. In the past, PyeongChang has hosted the 2018 Winter Olympics at its Alpensia Ski Jumping and Sliding Centers, both of which will be used again for the 2024 Youth Games. Approximately 30 miles northeast of PyeongChang lies the coastal city of Gangneung where indoor venues like the Ice Arena, the Hockey and Curling Centers, and the Gangneung Oval will host figure skating, speed skating, and other sports. These two cities will host almost every competition except alpine (downhill) skiing and snowboarding, which will take place at the Jeongseon High 1 Ski Resort and the Hoengseong Welli Hilli Park respectively.
Welcoming a record 1,900 athletes from all over the world, the Gangwon Games will be home to the hopes and dreams of these young Olympians for the two week period over which the Games will occur. Competitors ranging in age from 15-18 years hope to break personal bests and of course bring home the gold, giving spectators many athletes to look out and cheer for.One exciting athlete is Albania's Lara Colturi, whose mother is former Italian Alpine World Cup champion, Daniella Cecerellu.Big things are also expected from 16 year old Alpine skier, Annika Hunt, who has ties to New England as she is a graduate of Vermont’s Burke Mountain Academy of which decorated champion Mikeala Shifrin is also an alum. Hunt has already made a mark internationally in both Super-G and Slalom. The 2023 South Korean figure skating national champion, Shin Jia, is expected to perform well and be a crowd favorite.
The slogan for the 2024 Games, “Grow together, shine forever,” emphasizes the organizers’ view that these young Olympians will find that sport unites them and that peaceful coexistence is possible and worth working towards. Organizers believe that the Games will have a positive impact in the region and promote social unity.
The Youth Winter Olympic Games are set to begin in fewer than 60 days and will bring top young athletes together from all over the world, each hoping to accomplish their own goals and dreams.