Every four years, the world waits with baited breath, watching the different events of the Winter Olympics wondering what countries will capture the victories in different events. This year, the 2018 Winter Olympics are taking place in PyeongChang, South Korea and have been full of action.

The opening ceremony for the games was held February 9, 2018, in a $100 million facility that is only used for the Olympic and Paralympic games that are demolished following the games conclusion. This Winter Olympics featured 102 events in 15 different sports that will make this the first Winter Olympics to have more than 100 medal events. Six events are new to the PyeongChang games including big air snowboarding for both men and women, mixed doubles curling, mass start speed skating for men and women and mixed team alpine skiing.

As of Friday, February 16th, Norway has captured the most overall medals; however, Germany has captured the most gold medals. The United States has captured a total of eight medals ¾ five gold medals, one silver medal and two bronze medals.

The United States has been on a rocky ride since Luge athlete Erin Hamlin carried in the flag during the opening ceremonies. As of Friday February 16th, gold medals have been won by Redmond Gerard (snowboarding – men’s slopestyle), Jamie Anderson (snowboarding – women’s slopestyle), Chloe Kim (snowboarding – women’s halfpipe), Shaun White (snowboarding – men’s halfpipe) and Mikaela Shiffrin (alpine skiing – women’s giant slalom). Only Chris Mazdzer has won a silver medal for men’s singles in luge. Bronze medals were awarded to Nathan Chen, Alexa Scimeca Knierim, Chris Knierim, Mirai Nagasu, Adam Rippon, Alex Shibutani, Maia Shibutani and Bradie Tennell for team figure skating and Arielle Gold for snowboarding in the women’s halfpipe.

The reason I say that the United States has undergone a rocky ride so far in the games is that on days one and seven, the United States won no medals at all and the other days thus far, we have won one or two medals. Also, as of February 16th, more females have won medals in individual events than males. Individual females have one four medals, and individual males have won three medals.

Other sports the United States is competing in are the biathlon, bobsleigh, cross-country skiing, curling, ice hockey, Nordic combined, short track speed skating, skeleton, ski jumping and speed skating.

As we head into the final week of competition, we wish the best of luck to all of the teams competing in the 2018 Winter Olympics and acknowledge all of the perseverance and hard work that it takes to reach the games.