Let the Games Begin: Winter Olympics 2006 Start in Turin The Winter Olympic Games open February tenth. An estimated two thousand five hundred athletes and two thousand five hundred officials from about eighty-five countries will take part in the games. The athletes will compete to win medals in eighty-four events. They will test their skills in seven winter sports: biathlon(冬季两项，包括越野滑雪和步枪射击), bobsleigh(雪车), curling(冰壶), ice hockey(冰球), luge(无舵雪橇), skating and skiing. More than six hundred judges and other officials will supervise the games. About ten thousand reporters and media operators will report on the games. Thousands of people will attend, and millions more around the world will watch the Olympics on television. History of Olympic Games This will be the twentieth time the Olympic Winter Games have been held. The last Winter Games were held in Salt Lake City, Utah in the United States in 2002. The next Winter Olympic games will take place in Vancouver, Canada in 2010. The goal of the Olympic games is to bring people together in peace to honor universal moral ideas and the Olympic spirit. The modern Olympics are named after games held in ancient times. The games are said to have started in the ancient Greek city of Olympia, more than 2,700 years ago. The first thirteen Olympic games were foot races during celebrations to honor the Greek god, Zeus. Winners were honored with a crown of olive leaves placed around their heads. Greece continued to hold the games every four years for the next 1,000 years. The ancient Romans banned them in the 4th century when they ruled Greece. The Romans also destroyed the Olympic centers and sports fields. The first modern Olympics were held in Athens, Greece in 1896. Athletes from eight countries competed in ten sports. A French diplomat, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, had proposed a world celebration of sports like the ancient games in Greece. The purpose was to help athletes develop strength and values through competition. And the international event would provide a way for athletes of all nations to become friends. Today, the Olympics are the world's most famous sports event. The five rings of the Olympic sign represent this athletic friendship. They represent the linking, through sports, of five parts of the world: Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and the Americas. The colors of the rings are blue, yellow, black, green and red. Under the rings is the Olympic saying in Latin: 'Citius, Altius, Fortius.' In English, the words mean: 'Swifter, Higher, Stronger.' Sports of the Turin Winter Olympics The Turin Winter Olympics will include 84 events in 7 sports. Some of the sports are well known, like skiing and skating. Others, like luge, are not. Luge is the French word for sled. Luge athletes race by lying on their backs on sleds with steel runners. The athletes control the sleds with their feet as they speed down a track covered with ice. They compete to see who is the fastest. The sleds can reach speeds of up to 130 kilometers an hour. Curling is another sport that is not as well known. It began in Scotland. Each athlete on a four-member team slides a stone across the ice toward a circular target. The target is about two meters wide. The object is to slide the stone to the center of the target. Biathlon was added to the Winter Olympic Games in 1960. This sport began as a method for survival. Northern Europeans skied to hunt for food. Later they skied with weapons to defend their countries. Today, biathlon is considered a combination of two sports: cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. Snowboarding became an Olympic sport in 1998. In this sport, the athletes' feet are attached to a board as they move quickly on the snow. In one event, snowboarders slide up the sides of a huge hole built especially to perform. jumps. The athlet