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Russian athletes prior to 1992 competed at the Winter Olympic Games as part of the team from the Soviet Union (USSR). In 1992, they competed as part of the Unified Team, and as Russia from then on. In 2014 the Winter Olympics were held in Sochi, Russia.

The Russian team was banned from the 2018 Winter Olympics, though iIndividual athletes who qualified and who were also able to demonstrate they had complied with the IOC's doping regulations, were allowed to compete under the Olympic flag as "Olympic Athletes from Russia."

Russian athletes have been traditionally strong in a range of sports such as cross-country skiing, figure skating, biathlon and speed skating. The first athlete win a gold medal competing for Russia was Aleksandr Golubev in 1994 in the men's 500m Speed Skating. However, Russians had won many medals as part of the USSR and the unified team. The first was Lyubov Kozyreva winning the women's 10km cross-country skiing at the 1956 Winter Olympics.

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Trivia

• At Albertville in 1992, women's cross-country skier Raisa Smetanina of the Soviet Union won her 10th medal just before her 40th birthday to become the most successful, and oldest, Winter Olympic competitor, having participated in five Winter Games.
• At Lillehammer in 1994, Lyubov Yegorova of Russia won three cross-country skiing gold medals to match the Soviet speed skater Lydia Skoblikova's Olympic record of six gold medals.
• In Nagano in 1998 in the women's cross-country event, Russian Larissa Lazutina was the star taking home five medals (four in individual events) including two gold.
• A notable Russian athlete at the Winter Olympics is Vladimir Grigorev, the oldest man to capture a short track Olympic medal by winning the silver in the 1000m short track speedskating event in 2014.
• At the completion of the 2014 Winter Olympics, held in Sochi in Russia, the Russian team finished on top of the medal table. In the years following, several athletes were stripped of their medals for doping violations and the country dropped down the 2014 medal table.

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Related Pages

• Russia at the Summer Olympics
• Unified Team at the Winter Olympics
• See about USSR at the Winter Olympics.
• More Winter Olympics Countries
• Winter Olympics main page.
• About Sport in Russia