The XIV Winter Olympic Games were held from 8 to 19 February 1984 in the city of Sarajevo, the capital of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was part of the then unified state of Yugoslavia. 1,272 athletes from 49 countries competed for medals in 7 sports.
During the consideration of the application for the Winter Olympics, Sarajevo had very strong competitors: the Japanese city of Sapporo and the Swedish city of Gothenburg. Sapporo already hosted the 1972 Winter Olympics, so the Japanese persistently argued that they could successfully use both the existing infrastructure and the accumulated experience of holding such large and important competitions. Nevertheless, in the second round of voting, Sarajevo won with 39 votes against 33 for Sapporo. The official mascot of the Olympic Games is the cute wolf cub Vuchko.
The USSR national team at these games was considered as the main favorite to win in the team competition. We were especially looking forward to the victory of the national hockey team, because at the previous Olympics in Lake Placid our hockey players in the final part of the tournament sensationally lost to the USA team, which they were superior in all respects. This game went down in history as "Miracle on Ice". And it seemed that the expectations would come true, the USSR national team immediately began their performance with a victory: on the very first day of the competition, skier Nikolai Zimyatov won a gold medal at a distance of 30 km. But in the end, the USSR national team took only second place in the overall team competition, having won 25 medals - 6 gold, 10 silver and 9 bronze. Compared to the previous Olympics in Lake Placid, where 10 gold medals were won, this was a rather weak result.
Some consolation was the fact that our hockey players were among the gold medalists. The first place was won by the GDR national team, which received 9 gold, 9 silver and 6 bronze medals. Team USA finished third with 4 gold and 4 silver medals.
In general, the organization of the Olympics turned out to be at a high level, the games were held in a truly sporting atmosphere. The local population treated the members of the sports delegations with sincere cordiality. In short, the Sarajevo Olympics was a real celebration of sport and peace.
