Who Were The 1960 Winter Olympics Ski Participants?

If you decide to learn everything you can about past Olympic Games, you will eventually have to ask the question, "Who were the 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants?" Once you ask that, it is time to start investigating. The best places to start are at Olympic.org and the LA84 Foundation. Olympic.org is the official website of the Olympic movement, and the LA84 Foundation are supporters of youth sports programs. Both websites contain excellent information about not just the 1960 Winter Olympic Games, but all of the games since 1896.

The first thing you will discover is that the 1960 Winter Olympics were hosted at Squaw Valley. Squaw Valley is a ski resort in the state of California. It is located on top of the Sierra Nevada Mountain range. When Squaw Valley was chosen to be the host city, there was only one ski lift. The owner, Alexander Cushing, was the sole inhabitant of the property.

With the help of architectural blueprints, it went through major development. By the time the Olympics were to start, Squaw Valley had been transformed into a perfect site to host the Olympics. It became the first official Olympic Village. It was the perfect place for the 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants.

There were 30 nations that participated in the 1960 Winter Olympics. The entire Olympic Games for that year consisted of nine skiing events and seven skating events for the men. The women's events included five skiing events and six skating events. That means the 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants were spread out over fourteen ski events.

The five women's events included downhill races, slalom races, giant slalom races, a cross-country run and a relay race. The men's events included the same as the women's with a special jumping event and a Nordic combined event. There were three men's cross country runs, each for a different length. There was one that was fifteen km long, then one was 30 km long, and finally one that was 50 km long.

Denmark, South Africa and the Netherlands were the only three nations out of all 30 participants to have no athletes entered into any of the skiing events. This means there were only 27 nations with 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants, spread throughout fourteen different events. Germany, Norway and Sweden all had at least one athlete in every one of the skiing events.

Czechoslovakia, Iceland, Japan, Korea, Lebanon, Liechtenstein and Turkey had athletes participating only in men's events. Four of those, Iceland, Lebanon, Liechtenstein and Turkey, were entered in four events or less. Czechoslovakia and Korea was entered in five events each, and Japan was entered in nine.

The other twenty 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants had athletes entered in both men's and women's events. Chile, Hungary, New Zealand and Spain were all entered in five or six events. Austria and Poland entered athletes in eight events. Argentina, Australia, Bulgaria and Great Britain were all entered in nine different events. All the rest of the 1960 Winter Olympic ski participants were entered in either eleven or twelve of the skiing events. The nations included in this list are Canada, Finland, France, Italy, Switzerland, the USA and the USSR.

Of the 1960 Winter Olympics ski participants, only eleven nations won any of the medals. The highest medal count went to the USSR, with seven medals. Austria and Finland both earned six total medals. Germany and Sweden both collected five medals. France, Norway and the USA each got three medals. Switzerland received two medals, and Canada and Italy each managed to get one medal apiece. Germany got the most gold medals, the USA got the most silver medals, and the USSR got the most bronze medals.

The LA84 Foundation

The Official Website of the Olympic Movement