Revealed: Italian ski resort announced as host of 2026 Winter Olympics
The Italian ski resort of Cortina d’Ampezzo has been announced as the 2026 co-host of the Winter Olympics, alongside the city of Milan.
The Italian bid to host faced competition from only Stockholm and Åre in Sweden, after four other bidders, Sion in Switzerland, Sapporo in Japan, Graz in Austria and Calgary in Canada, dropped out of the race due to concerns over the scale and cost of hosting one of the world’s biggest sporting occasions.
The decision was announced at the 134th session of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Monday. Milan-Cortina received 47 out of 82 votes cast.
Earlier in the race, the Italian resort saw off competition from some less obvious winter destinations including Erzurum in eastern Turkey and Almaty in Kazakhstan.
Cortina last hosted the Winter Olympics in 1956, the seventh edition of the Games. The resort was originally awarded hosting rights to the 1944 event, but with the onset of the Second World War the decision was made to cancel the competition.
“Congratulations to Milan-Cortina. We can look forward to an outstanding and sustainable Olympic Winter Games in a traditional winter-sports country,” said Thomas Bach, president of the IOC.
The resort will share the hosting responsibility with Milan, a five-hour drive away. The skating and ice hockey events will be held in the city while Cortina will host most of the Alpine skiing events.
Other ski resorts will also be involved in hosting further snow-sport disciplines, such as ski slopestyle and snowboard big air, including Bormio and Livigno.
Cortina, which sits at 1,226m, is one of the oldest ski resorts in Europe and set among the iconic scenery of the Dolomites. Two hours from both Venice and Treviso airports the resort is popular with weekend visitors and non-skiers, attracted by its glamorous appeal. Its chic town centre is home to numerous luxury hotels dating from Victorian times and streets lined with designer boutiques and gourmet restaurants.
The resort, which has 120km of pistes spread out across three separate areas, regularly hosts races on the womens’ World Cup circuit and will host the Alpine World Championships in 2021, before the Games in 2026.
The Winter Olympics will take place from February 6 to 22 2026, with the Winter Paralympics taking place from March 6 to 15 2026.
“The passion and knowledge of Italian fans, together with experienced venue operators, will create the perfect atmosphere for the best athletes in the world. The Olympic Winter Games Milan-Cortina 2026 will feature iconic venues and beautiful settings, combining the attractions of a modern European metropolis with a classic Alpine environment,” said Bach.
The Olympic Agenda 2020 reforms, recently brought into place by the IOC, have highlighted the importance of making as much use of existing and temporary venues as possible when hosting the Games, if there is no demand for new permanent facilities afterwards. Of the 14 planned venues in Milan and Cortina 13 meet the existing or temporary criteria.
In 2018, just weeks before the Winter Olympics kicked off in PyeongChang, South Korea, a series of eerie photos revealed an abandoned South Korean resort that was not being used at all during the Games. Despite this the country had built a number of new venues, including a £75.4-million stadium that was only used twice – for the opening and closing ceremonies – after which it was demolished.
The proposed operating budgets presented by both the final candidates for the 2026 Games were on average 20 per cent lower than the spend in PyeongChang in 2018, and the budget that has been set for the Beijing Games in 2022.
The 2026 competition will be the 25th edition of the Games and will mark 70 years since the Italian resort last hosted the event. The first ever Winter Olympic Games was held in Chamonix, France, in 1924 and included just 16 nations, 258 athletes and 16 different competitions, as well as a prize for mountaineering, which was given to British explorer Charles Granville Bruce for his ascent of Everest in 1922.
By comparison, the PyeongChang Games welcomed 92 different national teams and more than 2,900 athletes, across 102 different competitions.
It was Great Britain’s most successful Winter Olympics. Snowboarder Billy Morgan won bronze in the inaugural snowboard big air final and skier Izzy Atkin also took to the podium when she finished third in the ski slopestyle contest. In total Team GB returned with five medals, the others won in the skeleton.
Before the spotlight turns to the Italian Alps, however, the Chinese capital of Beijing is currently preparing to host the 2022 Games. Since it was announced that China would host the sporting spectacle there has been a colossal rise in skiing in the country, with numerous indoor and dry ski slopes adding to the growing number of natural resorts in the country.
Liu Peng, president of the Chinese Olympic Committee, projected that the country will have 300 million winter-sport enthusiasts by the time the global sporting event comes to town – making China the biggest skiing nation on the planet.
