The 20th Winter Olympic?Games dropped its curtain in Turin
on Sunday night.
A party full of joy, to celebrate the success of the Olympic
Winter Games and the athletes' victories, with a touch of sadness
for an event that has come to an end. This is how the Closing
Ceremony of Turin 2006 Winter Olympics presented itself.
At this Olympics, the Chinese team won two gold medals, four
silver medals and five bronze medals, China's best performance in
history. Most remarkably, Chinese athlete Han Xiaopeng won the
title of men's freestyle skiing aerials, which was China's first
gold medal in a snow event and he became the first Chinese male
gold-medal winner at a winter Olympics.
Deputy chief of Chinese delegation in Turin, Xiao Tian, said
Chinese athletes have made progress in winter sports and young
athletes like women's 500-meter short track gold medallist Wang
Meng, have demonstrated talent in the arena. But compared with
summer games, China's winter sports are still undeveloped.
"Of course, the development of summer games and winter games is
unbalanced in China. But the good performance at this Olympics will
greatly push the development of winter sports and we will develop
some new winter sports."
And he proposed to extend the winter sports nationwide.
"To develop winter sports, we can't rely on only two or three
northern provinces. If more people in southern provinces
participate in winter sports, it will definitely improve the
overall level of winter Olympics. We have set up a policy to
promote winter sports to the south but we need cooperation from the
government."
18 countries overall have shared 84 gold medals at this
Olympics. Germany topped all countries by grabbing 11 golds, 12
silvers and six bronzes, followed by the United States and
Austria.
The next Olympic Winter Games will be held in Canada's Vancouver
in 2010.
(torino2006 and CRI February 27, 2006)
