The Eleventh Winter Olympic Games of 1972 were held in the Japanese city of Sapporo from February 3-13. They were attended by athletes from 35 countries, a total of 1006 people. 35 sets of awards were played in 10 sports.
The second half of the 60s of the last century was marked by a very difficult world political situation. The ever increasing confrontation between the USSR and the United States, local conflicts in Southeast Asia and other serious world problems have left their mark on the development of sports in general and the Olympic movement in particular.
At the 61st session of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which was held in January 1964 in Innsbruck, Austria, issues related to the organization of games and the removal of South African athletes from participation in the 1964 Olympics were considered. This was due to continued racial discrimination. Participants in a joint meeting of the International Sports Federations and the IOC, held on February 8, 1965 in Lausanne, Switzerland, considered the problem of excluding the influence of politics in the Olympic movement.
Despite the complexity of the situation in the world, the Olympic movement still received a new impetus in development. This is confirmed by the officially submitted application dated October 6, 1965, filed from the leadership of the National Olympic Committee of Japan to the President of the IOC. It requested that the city of Sapporo be considered as a candidate for the location of the XI Winter Olympic Games in 1972.
At the 64th session of the IOC held in Rome in April 1966, the issue of choosing the host country for the games of the eleventh Winter Olympics 1972 was decided. Sapporo won the right to host the Olympics by beating Finnish Lahti, Canadian Banff and American Salt Lake City. These games were the first Winter Olympics held outside the United States and Western Europe, and the fourth games outside these regions altogether (predecessors: Melbourne 1956, Tokyo 1964, Mexico City 1968).
Competitions were held at the Makomanai Olympic Center, where biathletes, speed skaters, skiers, figure skaters and hockey players competed, as well as on the nearby Teine Mountains (alpine skiing, luge, bobsleigh) and Eniva (downhill). About $ 550 million was spent on preparing for the games.
The largest number of medals at the Sapporo Olympics (three gold each) were won by the Soviet skier Galina Kulakova (5 and 10 km races, relay) and the Dutch skater Ard Schenck (races at 1,500, 5,000 and 10,000 meters). The sensation-discovery was the Japanese athletes-jumpers from the 70-meter springboard: Akitsugu Konno, Yukio Kasaya, Seiji Aochi won all three gold medals in this sport.
In terms of the total number of medals, the USSR team confidently came out on top, unexpectedly for everyone, the athletes of the GDR became the second, performing as an independent team for the second time.
