Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that can help answer the question.
Query: When were the first Winter Olympics?
The 1924 Winter Olympics, officially known as the I Olympic Winter Games (French: Les Iers Jeux olympiques d'hiver), were a winter multi-sport event which was held in 1924 in Chamonix, France. Originally held in association with the 1924 Summer Olympics, the sports competitions were held at the foot of Mont Blanc in Chamonix, and Haute-Savoie, France between January 25 and February 5, 1924.[1] The Games were organized by the French Olympic Committee, and were in retrospect designated by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as the I Olympic Winter Games.
Calgary first bid for the Winter Olympics was in 1959 for the 1964 Games, losing to Innsbruck. Their second Winter Olympic bid attempt was for the 1968 Winter Olympics, losing to Grenoble by three votes in 1964. The third time was the charm for Calgary in 1981 when they were awarded the 1988 Winter Olympics over Falun, Sweden and Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy.
The first Winter Olympics took place in 1924. Australia first competed at the Winter Olympics in 1936, when its sole representative, Kenneth Kennedy, participated in speed skating. Kennedy came 33rd in both the 1500 m and 5000 m, near the bottom of the standings. He was entirely on his own; no Australian support staff were in attendance, even though the AOF officially sanctioned Kennedy's entry. 
Sweden sent 112 athletes to the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin trying to win their first gold medal since the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer. A total of 99 athletes were selected, and they competed in nine of the fifteen Winter Olympic sports. When the medals were summed up, Sweden had managed seven gold medals, two silver and five bronze, making it Sweden's best result ever in the Winter Olympics in terms of both medals and gold medals earned, and gave Sweden a 6th place in the medal table.
The Ice Hockey World Championships is an annual event held by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF). It was preceded by the European Championship which was held from 1910 to 1932. The first World Championship tournament was decided at the 1920 Summer Olympics. Subsequently, ice hockey was featured at the Winter Olympic Games, where the World Championship was decided when the two events occurred concurrently, until the 1968 Winter Olympics. The first three championships were contested at the Olympics, while the first World Championships that were an individual event were held in 1930.
Luxembourg first joined Olympic competition at the 1900 Summer Olympics and first participated at the Winter Olympic Games at the 1928 Winter Olympics. Their participation at Winter Olympics since has been sporadic; Luxembourg did not sent a delegation to any Winter Olympics from 1948 to 1984. They also skipped the 2002 and the 2010 Winter Olympics. This was Luxembourg's eighth appearance at a Winter Olympics. In their history, Luxembourg has won medals at both the Summer and Winter Olympics; their Winter Olympics medals, both silver, were won in 1992. According to the quota allocation released on 20 January 2014, Luxembourg had one athlete in qualification position for alpine skiing and one for cross-country skiing, however, no alpine skiers were selected for the final Luxembourgian team. The final Luxembourgian team consisted of one cross-country skier, Kari Peters. He was selected as the flag bearer for the opening ceremony, while a volunteer carried the Luxembourg flag for the closing ceremony.
Before 1924, when the first Winter Olympic Games were celebrated, sports held on ice, like figure skating and ice hockey, were held at the Summer Olympics.[28] These two sports made their debuts at the 1908 and the 1920 Summer Olympics, respectively, but were permanently integrated in the Winter Olympics program as of the first edition. The International Winter Sports Week, later dubbed the IOlympic Winter Games and retroactively recognized as such by the IOC, consisted of nine sports. The number of sports contested at the Winter Olympics has since been decreased to seven, comprising a total of fifteen disciplines.[29]
The IOC organises the modern Olympic Games and Youth Olympic Games, held in summer and winter, every four years. The first Summer Olympics organised by the IOC was held in Athens, Greece, in 1896; the first Winter Olympics was in Chamonix, France, in 1924. Until 1992, both Summer and Winter Olympics were held in the same year. After that year, however, the IOC shifted the Winter Olympics to the even years between Summer Games, to help space the planning of the two events from one another, and improve the financial balance of the IOC, which receives greater income on Olympic years. The first Summer Youth Olympics were in Singapore in 2010 and the first Winter Youth Olympics were held in Innsbruck in 2012.
The Winter Olympic Games () is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympics, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were held in Chamonix, France. The modern Olympic games were inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, which were held in Olympia, Greece, from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. Baron Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1894, leading to the first modern Summer Games in Athens, Greece in 1896. The IOC is the governing body of the Olympic Movement, with the Olympic Charter defining its structure and authority. 
The 1928 Games were the first true "Winter Olympics" held on its own as they were not in conjunction with a "Summer Olympics". The preceding 1924 Games were retroactively renamed the inaugural Winter Olympics, though they had been in fact part of the 1924 Summer Olympics. All preceding Winter Events of the Olympic Games were the winter sports part of the schedule of the Summer Games, and not held as a separate Winter Games. These games also replaced the now redundant Nordic Games, that were held quadrennially since early in the century.
Denmark has been part of the Olympic movement since the beginning, having sent three athletes to the first modern Olympics in 1896. Since then, the only Summer Olympic Games they have missed is the 1904 Summer Olympics. Denmark then first competed at the Winter Olympics at the 1948 Winter Olympics. Squaw Valley was their third Winter Olympics appearance, having missed the 1956 Winter Olympics. The nation has won at least one medal at every Summer Olympics they have attended, but have won a Winter Olympics medal only once, in curling at the 1998 Winter Olympics. The 1960 Squaw Valley Winter Olympics were held from 18–28 February 1960; 665 athletes competed, representing 30 National Olympic Committees The only athlete Denmark sent to Squaw Valley was speed skater Kurt Stille.
Luxembourg first joined Olympic competition at the 1900 Summer Olympics and first participated at the Winter Olympic Games at the 1928 Winter Olympics. Their participation at Winter Olympics since has been sporadic, Luxembourg did not sent a delegation to any Winter Olympics from 1948 to 1984, and thus it had been 52 years since Luxembourg's last appearance. The 1988 Winter Olympics were held from 13–28 February 1988. Marc Girardelli was the only athlete sent to Calgary by Luxembourg. Armand Wagener was the flag bearer for the opening ceremony.
The following vehicles below were used in the filming of this special episode of "Top Gear":The motoring programme's "Winter Olympics Special" was viewed by 5 million people on its first showing, with a further 530,000 watching the repeat when it aired a week later. In a review for "The Guardian", Kathryn Flett described the "Winter Olympics Special" as a funny episode, with the Mini segment making her "giggle", before adding that the special was "entirely complementary to the Winter Olympics proper".
The 1994 Winter Olympics, held in Lillehammer, Norway, were the first Winter Games to be held separately from the Summer Games. This change resulted from the decision reached in the 91st IOC Session (1986) to separate the Summer and Winter Games and place them in alternating even-numbered years. Lillehammer is the northernmost city to ever host the Winter Games and it was the second time the Games were held in Norway, after the 1952 Winter Olympics in Oslo. After the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1993, the Czech Republic and Slovakia made their Olympic debuts. The women's figure skating competition drew media attention when American skater Nancy Kerrigan was injured on 6 January 1994, in an assault planned by the ex-husband of opponent Tonya Harding. Both skaters competed in the Games, but the gold medal was controversially won by Oksana Baiul who became Ukraine's first Olympic champion, while Kerrigan won the silver medal. Johann Olav Koss of Norway won three gold medals, coming first in all of the distance speed skating events. 13-year-old Kim Yoon-Mi became the youngest-ever Olympic gold medallist when South Korea won the women's 3,000 meter speed skating relay. Russia won the most events, with eleven gold medals, while Norway achieved 26 podium finishes, collecting the most medals overall on home ground. Juan Antonio Samaranch described Lillehammer as "the best Olympic Winter Games ever" in his closing ceremony speech.
The 1992 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XVI Olympic Winter Games (), were a winter multi-sport event celebrated from 8 to 23 February 1992 in Albertville, France. They were the last Winter Olympics to be held the same year as the Summer Olympics, and the first where the Winter Paralympics were held at the same site. Albertville was selected as host in 1986, beating Sofia, Falun, Lillehammer, Cortina d'Ampezzo, Anchorage and Berchtesgaden. The games were the third Winter Olympics held in France, after Chamonix in 1924 and Grenoble in 1968, and the fifth Olympics overall in the country.
Luxembourg first joined Olympic competition at the 1900 Summer Olympics and first participated at the Winter Olympic Games at the 1928 Winter Olympics. Their participation at Winter Olympics since has been sporadic, Luxembourg did not send a delegation to any Winter Olympics from 1948 to 1984. Lillehammer marked their fifth appearance at a Winter Olympics, and their only Winter Olympic medals as of 2018 are two silver medals from the immediately preceding 1992 Winter Olympics. The 1994 Winter Olympics were held from 12–27 February 1994, a total of 1,713 athletes competed, representing 67 National Olympic Committees. Georges Diderich served as the chef de mission of the Luxembourgian delegation to Lillehammer, and the competitive delegation consisted of a single athlete, alpine skier Marc Girardelli. Diderich served as the flag bearer for the opening ceremony.
Skeleton is a winter sport featured in the Winter Olympics where the competitor rides head-first and prone (lying face down) on a flat sled. It is normally run on an ice track that allows the sled to gain speed by gravity. It was first contested at the 1928 Winter Olympics in St. Moritz and again in 1948 Winter Olympics, after which it was discontinued as an Olympic sport. Skeleton was reintroduced at the 2002 Winter Olympics, with both men's and women's events, and has been held in each Winter Olympic competition since. Skeleton is so-named as the first metal sleds introduced in 1892 were said to resemble a human skeleton.
The Asian Winter Games (AWG) is an international multi-sport event held every four years for members of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) which features winter events. The Japanese Olympic Committee first suggested the idea of holding a winter version of the Asian Games in 1982. Their efforts were rewarded when they were finally given hosting rights for the first edition that was held in Sapporo in 1986, as the city had the infrastructure and expertise gained from hosting of the 1972 Winter Olympics.
Luxembourg first joined Olympic competition at the 1900 Summer Olympics and first participated at the Winter Olympic Games at the 1928 Winter Olympics. Their participation at Winter Olympics since has been sporadic, Luxembourg did not sent a delegation to any Winter Olympics from 1948 to 1984. The 1992 Winter Olympics were held from 8–23 February 1992. Albertville marked their fourth appearance at a Winter Olympics. The delegation sent by Luxembourg to Albertville consisted of a single alpine skier, Marc Girardelli.
The first Olympics after the war, the 1920 Summer Olympics, were held in Antwerp, Belgium, and featured figure skating and an ice hockey tournament. Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey were banned from competing in the Games. At the IOC Congress held the following year it was decided that the host nation of the 1924 Summer Olympics, France, would host a separate "International Winter Sports Week" under the patronage of the IOC. Chamonix was chosen to host this "week" (actually 11 days) of events. The Games proved to be a success when more than 250 athletes from 16 nations competed in 16 events. Athletes from Finland and Norway won 28 medals, more than the rest of the participating nations combined. Germany remained banned until 1925, and instead hosted a series of games called Deutsche Kampfspiele, starting with the winter edition of 1922 (which predated the first Winter Olympics). In 1925 the IOC decided to create a separate winter event and the 1924 Games in Chamonix was retroactively designated as the first Winter Olympics.
Three NOCs won a single medal: Canada (silver), Poland and Spain (gold). For the last two, these were their first-ever gold medals at the Winter Olympics, and in the case of Spain, it was its very first medal. This was Canada's weakest result since the 1936 Winter Olympics, when its athletes also brought home a single silver medal.
The NOCs from the Republic of China and the Philippines sent athletes to the Winter Olympics for the first time, but failed to win any medals.
Australia's second Winter Olympic Games appearance was at the 1952 Winter Olympics in Oslo, Norway. It was 16 years since Australia's last Winter Games, as the 1940 and 1944 Winter Olympics were cancelled, and Australia did not compete in the 1948 Winter Olympics. Australia sent nine athletes and competed in alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, figure skating and speed skating. Nancy Hallam and Gweneth Molony were Australia's first women athletes at the Winter Olympics.
Nagano first attempted to host the Winter Olympics in 1940, but lost out to Sapporo. Those Olympics were abandoned in 1937 when Japan invaded China for the second time, forcing Sapporo's withdrawal. The city tried again for the Winter Olympics in 1968 in 1961, but lost out in domestic voting to Sapporo who in turn lost out to Grenoble, France in 1964. Sapporo would host the Winter Olympics finally in 1972. A third time for the Winter Olympics began in 1983 with a full bid for the Winter Games approved two years later. With the bid committee established in 1986 and lessons learned from previous mistakes, Nagano's bid for the Winter Olympics in Japan was approved in 1989. A revamped bid committee was launched later that year with presentations given to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1990. When the IOC session was in Tokyo in September 1990, Nagano was among the cities launching promotional campaign for the 1998 Winter Olympics. The following June at the IOC session in Birmingham, England, Nagano was awarded the 1998 Games in the fifth round, defeating Salt Lake City, Utah in the United States by four votes.
Denmark joined the modern Olympic movement at the beginning, participating in the first modern Games, the 1896 Summer Olympics. The National Olympic Committee and Sports Confederation of Denmark was formally recognised by the International Olympic Committee on 1 January 1905. Denmark has sent a team to every Summer Olympic Games except the 1904 St. Louis Olympics, and they first participated in the Winter Olympic Games in the 1948 St. Moritz Olympics. Their participation at Winter Olympics has been sporadic, and these Calgary Games were their first time competing at a Winter Olympics since the 1968 Grenoble Olympics 20 years prior. The 1988 Winter Olympics were held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada from 13–28 February 1988; a total of 1,423 athletes representing 57 National Olympic Committees took part. Denmark was represented in Calgary by a single figure skater, Lars Dresler, who was selected as the flag-bearer for the opening ceremony.
Freestyle skiing is one of the six skiing disciplines contested at the Winter Olympic Games, and one of the youngest. In 1924, the first Winter Olympics featured Nordic skiing disciplines (cross-country skiing, ski jumping, and Nordic combined), while alpine skiing was first contested in 1936. Only at the 1992 Winter Olympics, in Albertville, France, were freestyle skiing events first held as official medal events. Before that, freestyle skiing was contested at the 1988 Winter Olympics as a demonstration sport, consisting of events for both men and women in three variants: moguls, aerials and ski ballet. In Albertville, moguls was the first-ever official freestyle skiing medal event; aerials and ski ballet were also held but still as demonstration events. The growing popularity of aerials convinced the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to add this freestyle discipline to the 1994 Winter Olympics official program. Moguls and aerials have thus been contested at every Winter Games since. Ski cross inclusion in the Winter Olympics program was approved at an IOC Executive Board meeting in November 2006, and the first events were held at the 2010 Winter Olympics.