Gangwon Games breaks down barriers as global sport exits Covid era

Korean athletes attend the closing ceremony of the Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympics at Gangneung Olympic Park in Gangneung, Gangwon on Feb. 1. [YONHAP]

The Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympics ended with a snowy closing ceremony last week, bookending a pivotal chapter for Korea and world sport.

Six years ago, nations convened in Korea for the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics, the first time in this century that a country in Asia played host to the world’s biggest winter sports competition.

It was a zeitgeist moment for Korea, who used the tournament to cement their place on the world stage, and was also one of the last major international sports contests before the Covid-19 pandemic shut down the world. Stadiums closed down and shut out fans before the world of sport cautiously re-opened, first with social distanced seating and slowly, with food and drink and cheering again.

And it was in Korea, at the Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympics, that international sport would seem to make its return.

Of course, in between PyeongChang and Gangwon, there was the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympics in 2021, and Beijing 2022 marked the return of the winter parallel, but even that was highly restricted to spectators with sparse crowds in jarringly empty stands.

But there was essentially no barrier at the Youth Olympics in Gangwon. Tickets to watch every event — from alpine skiing in Pyeongchang to curling in Gangneung — were totally free, with the only requirement being that spectators reserve their seats in advance.

While the level of competition at a tournament for athletes between the ages of 15 and 18 might have been lower than that at the senior Games — although there was little evidence that this was really the case on the ground — it was a unique chance for fans to watch popular Olympic sports up close from really great seats for zero cost.

The Youth Olympics had everything a senior Games would — activities for spectators, a huge tent for food, in-store exclusive merch and hype around the mascot.

A giant inflatable Moongcho stood in the center of all the action at Gangneung Olympic Park in Gangneung, Gangwon — the site of the ice events — as Games-goers peeled off the path toward the arenas to snap smiling selfies. A person in a 7-foot-tall Moongcho costume also made their way around the park, greeting visitors outside and energizing the crowd during the countdown to gold medal games.

The athletes were also held to the same standard as their senior counterparts, subject to doping tests before every event, according to Kim Min-yeong, a volunteer who was assigned to work as part of the “doping crew.”

Kim, 21, worked the Games as a chaperone for youth athletes, moving them to and from trips to the doping control station located in the Gangneung Hockey Centre.

“Honestly, I didn’t know I’d do this chaperone job, but I’m glad to be a chaperone because we’re close to athletes,” Kim said.

Kim was among about 2,000 local volunteers who helped out with the organizing, forming fast friendships. During the closing ceremony, volunteers wearing their iconic scarlet and white ski jackets hung around together in groups.

Plus, the athletes were competing on the same ice and mountains as their senior counterparts did six years ago — a rare chance for the next generation of Olympians.

But what set Gangwon apart from PyeongChang was the junior tournament’s spotlight on friendship and fun. A sort of participation trophy energy blanketed the tournament as there seemed to be a concerted effort to remove any sort of shame from failing to earn a spot on the podium.

After an event’s conclusion and the release of final results, a cheery voice would blast over the speakers, announcers asking crowds to cheer for all the athletes, thanking them for their participation and hard work.

And it was apt that as athletes headed outside for a festival-esque closing ceremony that they were met with an aisle of cheering crowds, arriving for what felt like a graduation.

BY MARY YANG [mary.yang@joongang.co.kr]