2 . Golden Generation

A national team, mostly consisting of teenagers, pushed China to its biggest-ever medal achievement at the Winter Olympics. At the same time, a series of breakthroughs at the Games _________ the country’s emergence as a much more well-rounded force on the ice and snow.

_________ the heroics of teenage sensation Gu Ailing and seasoned aerials(空中技巧滑雪)masters Xu Mengtao and Qi Guangpu, China _________ four gold to top the freestyle skiing medal standings for the first time after its Winter Olympic debut in 1980.

Gu Ailing also became the first athlete _________, and the youngest _________, to win three medals(golds in Big Air, halfpipe and silver in slopestyle)in three different freeski _________ at the Olympics, throwing her to international super-star reputation as the _________ of Beijing 2022.

Needless to say, another teenager star, Su Yiming, also became a _________   name by winning China’s first snowboarding gold medal in Big Air after claiming a silver in slopestyle. Su’s _________ helped the host finish a highest-ever third on the Games’ overall medal standings, ____________ nine gold, four silver and two bronze-its biggest-ever medal achievement at the Winter Games. China’s ____________ best was a tally of 11, including five gold, at the 2010 Games in Vancouver.

“The ____________ of the new generation on the Olympic stage, even seeing the emergence of teenagers, ____________ a great future for winter sports in our country,” said Li Yang, manager of China’s Big Air, slopestyle and halfpipe national programs.

“With winter sports becoming popular in our country amid the fast social and ____________ development, I believe more and more young people will ____________ skis and snowboards to enjoy the sport, just as young as Su and Gu did when they were little, which will ____________ expand the talent pool for our future national programs,”Li said.

The Beijing Winter Games also ____________ the first time that China’s snow sports teams outperformed the country’s traditionally strong ice sports squads in the medal numbers, securing investment in high-performance training programs and ____________ the foundation for even better results at the next Winter Games in Italy.

“____________ we keep the tendency going, I believe we will ____________ a stronger performance in four years' time at the next Olympics in 2026,” said Yang Yang, China’s first Winter Olympic gold medalist, in women’s short-track speed skating at the 2002 Games.

7 . Anyone watching the Winter Olympics in Beijing, China over the last few days will have seen lots and lots of snow ----– man-made snow. Since the area gets little natural snow, this is the first time the Winter Olympics is taking place on almost 100% artificial snow.

This year’s Winter Olympics are being held in Beijing, China, and in two areas northwest of Beijing, Yangqing and Zhangjiakou. The areas get cold in the winter, but they don’t get a lot of snow. That’s because they’re not far from the Gobi Desert, and are generally very dry.

That meant some serious changes were needed to hold the Winter Olympics there. China took water from a reservoir which helps supply Beijing’s drinking water and sent it to a nearby river. To carry the water to the mountains for making snow, the country ran miles and miles of pipes. China says making the snow took about 49,000 gallons (185,500 liters) of water. Outside experts say it probably took a lot more water than that.

China hired an Italian company called TechnoAlpin to create the snow. TechnoAlpin created artificial snow at several earlier Winter Olympics. For the snow in this year’s Olympics, TechnoAlpin laid over 40 miles (64 kilometers) of pipe and brought in hundreds of snow-making machines. Even with all of those machines, making the snow for this year’s Games took seven weeks.

It’s useful to be able to make snow when nature doesn’t provide enough. But artificial snow isn’t the same as natural snow, which has more air and less water. An athlete used to natural snow might have to adjust their style on man-made snow.Still, the machines that make artificial snow are quite advanced. They can make several different kinds of snow depending on what’s needed for each sport. For example, the snow they make for downhill skiing is different from the snow made for cross-country skiing.

A few athletes have complained about the snow at this year’s Olympics. Most others say it’s been just fine.

In recent years, it has become more and more common to use artificial snow at winter sports events. That’s true even in places that used to have a lot of snow naturally. Some artificial snow was used in the Winter Olympics in 2010 and 2014 because of warm weather. In the 2018 Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, roughly 90% of the snow was man-made.

As the world warms because of climate change, problems like this are expected to become far more common. Michael Mayr, who leads TechnoAlpin in Asia, says, “You could not have winter sports now without man-made snow.”

8 . Skeleton is one of the three sliding sports at the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games, alongside the luge(单雪橇)and bobsleigh(大雪橇). With only six medals up for grabs, skeleton has the fewest events at the Winter Games—which means competition will be fierce.

The sport of skeleton has its roots in the most popular winter pastime: sleighing. In the mid-19^th century, British and American holidaymakers built the first toboggan(平底雪橇)run in Davos in 1882, and thus the sport of sleighing began.

Two years later, in 1884, the famed Cresta Run—a natural ice skeleton racing toboggan track—was built in St. Moritz, Switzerland(the course has hosted the annual Grand National championships since 1885).

In 1892, a new sledge made entirely of steel was introduced, and some claim that its bony appearance gave the sledge and the sport the name ‘skeleton’.

Men’s skeleton was first introduced on the Olympic program in the 1928 Games in St. Moritz. But due to the sport only being available at the Cresta Run at the time, it fell into obscurity(默默无闻)while the luge and bobsleigh grew in popularity. However, in 2002, the skeleton was reintroduced as a men’s and women’s event at the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, and has remained a part of the Olympic program ever since.

While Great Britain has the most medals(nine)in skeleton competition at the Olympics, the top spot belongs to the United States(eight medals)by virtue of having four silvers to Great Britain’s one(both nations have three golds, while Britain has five bronze medals, and the United States one).

Great Britain is the only nation to have won a medal every time skeleton has featured at the Olympic Games, and has won at least one medal in each of the five contests of women’s skeleton since its introduction.