PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — By the time the 23rd Olympic Winter Games get around to their Opening Ceremony on Friday, hundreds of athletes will already have been in action for a day and a half, starting Wednesday night with a new version of the ice chess otherwise known as curling.
The pomp and pageantry of the official Opening Ceremony won't get under way in PyeongChang until 6 a.m. ET Friday. But by daybreak Thursday ET, the brooms will already have been out for eight games of mixed doubles curling; men's ski jumping will also be well under way by dawn. Meanwhile, one of the most popular events, figure skating, glides into action Thursday night.
"It's fun, but it's cold," said Rich Lepping, chairman of the U.S. Curling Association, who watched as U.S. siblings Matt and Becca Hamilton won their first match in the inaugural mixed doubles curling competition Thursday morning against a team of Olympic athletes from Russia...
Men's individual normal hill ski jumping, which takes off with qualifying at 7:30 a.m. ET Friday, will feature one of the stars of the Games, three-time medalist Noriaki Kasai of Japan. At 45, Kasai — known as The Legend — is taking part in an unprecedented eighth Winter Olympiad."It's an amazing record," Kasai told The Japan Times. "I'm really excited. My goal is the same every time, and it's to win a gold medal."
NBC is airing 176 hours of live coverage in the United States, concluding with the Closing Ceremony on Feb. 25. NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports app, meanwhile, will stream more than 1,800 hours of coverage.
Erik Ortiz and Alex Johnson, reporters
