Winter Sports World: Remembering Salt Lake City 2002; Utah and its Olympic ski resorts celebrate their 20th Anniversary

Overcoming the scars of an Olympic scandal and the horrors of the 9/11 terrorist attacks that occurred just five months prior, the Salt Lake City 2002 Olympic Winter Games left an indelible mark not just at home in the U.S., but throughout the international sports world.

Venture capitalist Mitt Romney took over leadership with three years to go, rescuing the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC) and bid committee kingpins from their tarnished start, a scandal which transformed Olympic bidding and candidate city visits. Somehow, Romney and SLOC organizers managed to navigate all obstacles to deliver memorable Games in the Utah capital and across its snowy Park City ski resorts.

With 60,000 spectators looking on, the February 8th opening ceremony at Rice-Eccles Olympic Stadium was emotional and powerful. U.S. president George W. Bush sat alongside athletes, while International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Jacques Rogge addressed the competitors, presiding over his first Olympic Games.

Teammates from the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” U.S. Olympic hockey team lit the Olympic cauldron, following eight American athletes carrying a torn U.S. World Trade Center flag into the stadium.

“I remember all of the athletes and the servicemen that brought in that flag - it was a powerful moment and to walk in after them and meet all these incredible athletes, making friends for life,” said U.S. freestyle skier Shannon Bahrke, who won the first U.S. medal, a silver in moguls the morning after the opening ceremony. “It was surreal and a moment that is forever etched in my mind.”

“Everything was just heightened because of the emotional state of the country at that time,” said U.S. downhill racer Marco Sullivan. “We were just really proud to be Americans representing our country.”

Salt Lake City overwhelming won its bid on the first round of voting at the 1995 IOC Session in Budapest. Utah’s victory quickly conjured Olympic dreams.

“When we got the bid I cried and my sport skeleton wasn’t even an Olympic sport then – I just loved that the Olympics were coming,” said U.S. skeleton athlete and Salt Lake City resident Tristan Gale.

“To go from that, to being in the Olympics, and winning at the Olympics, and having watched Mitt Romney take over everything, the scandal, and people were wondering ‘are the Mormons going to accept everyone when they come?” Gale recalled.

In the aftermath of 9/11, security levels were extremely tight, unlike any ever seen at a previous Winter Games.

Sullivan and the U.S. alpine skiers stayed at a bed and breakfast near Snowbasin Resort, north of Salt Lake City, where the downhill and super-G events were contested.

“We had full-time security detail monitoring us there and to get to the mountains for training runs, the cars were searched every morning and we had to go through all the hoops that are now kind of expected,” Sullivan recalled. “It was the first time we had seen anything like that – that was pretty shocking.”

While Bode Miller established himself as one of the stars of the 2002 Games, aggressively and acrobatically racing to two silver medals, it was the 21-year-old Sullivan, from Tahoe City, California, posting the top U.S. result in the men’s downhill on the new Grizzly course at Snowbasin.

“One thing that stood out to me was when buses were late arriving in traffic on the downhill day, and Mitt Romney was supposedly out there directing traffic and helping out – it was kind of the first time we really heard his name,” Sullivan said.

Bluebird Utah weather

Enhancing an already upbeat atmosphere, especially as witnessed on Park City’s vibrant Main Street, the Wasatch Mountains weather was ideal, with an abundance of snow arriving prior to the Games, cold temperatures the first week, followed by additional sun and spring-like conditions the second week.

“It snowed like two feet I think before we got there and I’ll never forget the way it looked,” said Bahrke, who won her silver medal on Deer Valley’s Champion run, still one of the toughest challenges on the World Cup circuit today.

“It’s that snow that looks like a whole bunch of diamonds – it just looks like the whole world is sparkling and it was just like that for our event. It was this Bluebird sky, beautiful snowy trees and this diamond-like snow. It was just magic.”

Some 2,399 athletes from 77 countries competed across 78 medal events, February 8-24, 2002. The U.S. Olympic team fared well at its familiar venues and ski resorts. Team USA was third in the medal count with 10 gold, only trailing Norway (13) and Germany (12). The host nation was also second in total medals with 34, just behind Germany’s leading tally of 36 medals.

The two biggest medal winners at Salt Lake 2002 were Ole Einar Bjoerndalen of Norway and Janica Kostelic of Croatia. The Norwegian biathlon legend won four gold medals in the four biathlon events, sweeping the competition. In women’s alpine skiing, Kostelic won three gold medals and four medals total. The Croatian sensation became the first Olympic alpine skier to tally four medals at one Games.

Snow day for Salt Lake City local at Utah Olympic Park

The only substantial snowfall came the morning in which Gale and her male counterpart Jim Shea, a third-generation Olympian, both slid to skeleton gold. Gale’s U.S. teammate Lea Ann Parsley took silver.

“It was the great snow race – the biggest snowfall of the Games,” said Gale, who was a surprise gold medalist, just age 21. “If you can ever be more exhausted out of happiness, then that is the way to do it,” she said, also referring to the numerous obligations that followed her victory, including nearly leaving her gold medal in a taxi.

The 2002 Olympics also created opportunities for Gale’s parents. Her father was a bobsled and skeleton official, while her mother coordinated efforts at the Olympic Village.

“My whole family was a part of the Olympics separate from even having a kid at the Games,” Gale said. “Being from Salt Lake City, I was there for the road construction, airport expansion, and all of the unpleasantries of bringing the Olympics to a host town.”

For the 20th Anniversary of the 2002 Games, an Olympic flame re-lighting ceremony is planned at Rice-Eccles Olympic Stadium, while Beijing Games viewing parties are scheduled at venues such as Utah Olympic Park and Soldier Hollow.

No confirmation if Romney will show up for what will certainly be another memorable Utah evening.

Bringing the Games back to the ‘World’s Greatest Snow’

The U.S. athletes shared their thoughts about the legacy of the Salt Lake Games, which were financially profitable leading to a substantial endowment fund of $76 million, managed by the newly-created Utah Olympic Legacy Foundation, to help maintain the Olympic venues on a long-term basis.

“The legacy is that almost every single venue is still in use,” Bahrke said. “Not only are they being used for elite level athletes, but also to train athletes and inspire young athletes, future Olympians, and that’s really special.”

Considering their glorious memories from 20 years past, the U.S. Olympians are envisioning a return of the Winter Games to Utah’s snow-packed ski resorts and Salt Lake ice arenas, hoping that the IOC will opt for 2030.

“Not only could they do a good job, but I think it would be very healthy for the Olympic movement to re-use some venues and get away from the trend of manufacturing resorts and ski areas just to hold the Olympic Games,” Sullivan said.

“The proud Salt Lake City native Gale added: “We’re just waiting for the chance to have a whack at another Olympics.”

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