Having started off-piste with protests over ICE agents and reports of penis injections, the Milan and Cortina Winter Olympics got back on track with a bulgingly ambitious opening ceremony either side of the Italian Alps.
Mariah Carey crooned ‘Volare’ and Andrea Bocelli belted out ‘Nessun Dorma’ in a marathon four-hour show at San Siro, in which the only note of friction was booing for the attending United States vice-president JD Vance.
Organisers dealt seamlessly with the logistics of organising four simultaneous athletes’ parades in Milan, Cortina, Livigno and Predazzo, marking the start of a Games that will play out across an unprecedented 14,000 square miles of peaks and chutes.
Italian skiing legends Alberto Tomba and Deborah Compagnoni jointly lit the cauldron at the Arc of Peace in Milan, while another alpine hero, Sofia Goggia, lit an unprecedented second cauldron in Cortina.
But the ceremony’s creative concept of ‘armonia’, or harmony, was not afforded as far as Vance. Moments after the US team were cheered into the San Siro, Vance, fleetingly appearing on stadium screens, was heartily booed.
International Olympic Committee president Kirsty Coventry, in her first Games since replacing Thomas Bach in March last year, said: “From north to south, east to west, the flame shines as a beacon of hope for all.
“Tonight, that flame will ignite the cauldron. Its light will shine for the athletes – and from them, it will spark inspiration across the world.”
Bobsleigh pilot Brad Hall and Lilah Fear, one half of an ice dance partnership with Lewis Gibson, carried the Union Jack in Cortina and Milan respectively, on behalf of a 53-strong Team GB squad with high hopes of eclipsing their previous Winter Olympic best.
British sliders dominated the World Cup skeleton season, curlers top world rankings in both men’s and mixed doubles and three British snowboard and freestyle stars won gold medals at the prestigious Aspen X Games last month.
Global stars do not come much bigger than Lindsay Vonn, who is persisting in her comeback bid despite rupturing a knee ligament last week, or Eileen Gu, the Chinese freestyle star whose popularity transcends the globe.
Meanwhile, from the city to the mountains, Italians dream of uncovering a new generation of Olympic stars to match the likes of Tomba and Goggia. In such dreams, an unprecedented and far-flung Games will discover its unifying force.
