After five minutes, armchair viewers become instant experts
to what will be a mixed reception from the global audience. A combination of China’s human-rights record and its challenge to American geopolitical leadership may dent viewer enthusiasm in the crucial American market. Moreover, the TV audience for both summer and winter Olympics has been in steady decline for many years; the winter Olympics in South Korea, four years ago, had the lowest American audience on record.
Some of these sports are seriously obscure. Curling is a version of lawn bowls, but transported to an ice rink. Contestants slide stones towards a target further up the ice rink; the closest stones win. Other team members sweep the ice in an attempt to make the stone move faster or straighter. There are a lot of tactics involved; the sport has been dubbed “chess on ice”.
The specialist nature of winter sports means that the games are dominated by rich countries to an even greater extent than the summer Olympics. In 2018 no competitor from Africa, central or South America won a medal. Norway, one of the world’s wealthiest countries but with just 5m inhabitants, topped the medals table. Austrian athletes achieved five gold medals; China just one.
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