Winter sports include all sports disciplines that take place on ice or snow, whether in natural or artificially propagated conditions.
Usually these sports are held only in cold areas during the winter, but in recent decades, the introduction of synthetic materials that allow to slide on surfaces such as snow or ice, the construction of indoor sports facilities and systems of distribution of “” artificial snow has permitted to extend the practice of winter sports to places where the climate or lack of high natural terrain does not allow the performance.
Winter sports often have their multi-sport tournaments, such as the Winter Olympics, these include the most important (though not all) sports that are practiced in snow and ice.
- Biathlon
The biathlon is a winter sport that consists of a race in which contestants combine cross-country skiing with shooting at the target with a carbine.
The athlete starts the cross-country skiing race in which at specific points of the course the participants must stand up and make five shots with a rifle on a static target, penalizing each failure either by traveling an additional distance or by adding time to the total of the test, and finally winning the one that totals less time.
- Curling
Curling is a precision sport, similar to bowling, which is practiced on an ice rink. It consists of two teams of four players each. The goal is to throw stones on an ice rink into a marked area called “home.” For every stone inside the house, or closer to its center, the “button,” teams get the point.
- Alpine skiing
Alpine skiing, also known as Descent, skiers go down snow-covered mountains on blazed slopes or be marked with signs. Given the similar times of the runners, a special Chrono is needed to measure the hundredths of a second. Skiers require good reflexes and high concentration. They must also be in full shape.
- Artistic skiing
Free or aesthetic skiing was born in the 1960s in the United States. It combines the speed of Alpine skiing with the agility of gymnasts: skiers make turns, jumps, flips, and other acrobatics in the air. The three best-known modalities: ballet, potholes, and leaps.
- Ski Cross
Cross-country skiing, despite being a scheduled race event, is often considered part of freestyle skiing, since it incorporates the characteristics of the terrain that are commonly found in freestyle, similar to the’ boardercross ‘of’ snowboarding’, in which athletes run in groups for a track that includes jumps, turns, and slopes. Until now, the artistic or freestyle ski program only included tests of acrobatic jumps and potholes.
- Cross-country skiing
The cross-country skiers travel long distances uphill (climbing technique), downhill (descent technique) and in the flat terrain (plain method), equipped with light and narrow skis and walking sticks. The skis are lighter than those used in the track; they have micro-scales a synthetic fabric full of millions of pelts that prevent skiing from going back even on the steepest slopes.
- Backcountry skiing
Cross-country skiing is a modality between mountaineering and skiing. It usually does not require prepared or marked areas where long distances are covered with skis, and which aims to make an ascent and descent of a peak, a crossing or an excursion.
Typically, skis, fixations, and boots allow the free movement of the heel to enable a rhythm of walking, as in the Nordic countries, and unlike in Alpine skiing.
- Speed skiing
Speed skiing is the fastest non-motorized sport in the world. Jumping from the top of a slope, skiers can go from 0 to 200Km/h in less than 6 seconds.
The competitors lower the track one after the other. After accelerating for almost 500 meters, they are timed at a distance of 100 meters.
- Orientation skiing
In the cross-orientation of the task of the athlete is found mainly in choosing the path from a beacon to another; first in the choice of route and then stay in the selected direction, to visit several control points in the shortest time possible. The athlete has to make hundreds of high-speed route choices. A slight lack of concentration for only a hundredth of a second can cost the medal. The clock is the judge: the fastest buy time. The electronic card checks that the sportsman has visited all control points in the correct order
- Nordic Combination
The Nordic combination consists of a combination of two sports modalities: one of the ski jumps, made from a springboard, and one of cross-country skiing.
- Ice Hockey
Hockey is one of sport’s most fast of the world the players skate across the ice behind a rubber disc (puck) with a stick (long stick) that can reach up to 160 Km/h. It was invented in the late 19th century in Canada, from the hand of the European immigrants that adapted hockey grass to the climatology of the area.
- Ice skating
The figure skating. The skaters perform a series of elegant acrobatic movements on the ice at the rhythm of the music. Skaters require several years of training to perform their routines.