[1] The Games' logo depicted a stylized profile of the Mole Antonelliana building, drawn in white and blue ice crystals, signifying the snow and the sky.
[6] The selection of Turin over Sion came as a surprise around the world since the Swiss city was seen as the overwhelming favorite in part because the IOC had their headquarters in Switzerland.
[7] Some analysts attribute the choice of Turin as a reaction to Swiss IOC member Marc Hodler's role in exposing the bribery scandal surrounding Salt Lake City's bid for the 2002 Winter Olympics[8] The information below comes from the International Olympic Committee Vote History Archived 25 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine web page.
Executive Producer Marco Balich, Content Supervisor Alfredo Accatino, Art Direction Lida Castelli.
[14][15] The first gold medal of the 2006 Games was awarded in the 20 kilometre biathlon, won by German Michael Greis on the first day of competition.
Ice hockey began with the women's competition; Sweden defeated Russia 3–1 in the first match while Canada's team opened with the second most lopsided win in Olympic history by beating the host Italians 16–0.
Zhang Dan fell, injuring her knee, but the pair finished their program to a standing ovation and took the silver medal.
The men's combined alpine skiing was riddled with disqualifications, including front-runners Bode Miller and Benjamin Raich.
China won its first gold of 2006 with Wang Meng's victory in the women's individual 500-metre short track speed skating.
In men's curling action, Great Britain edged Germany 7–6, Switzerland kept New Zealand winless by winning 9–7, Canada beat Norway 7–6, and the United States defeated Sweden, 10–6.
On 17 February, Tanja Frieden of Switzerland took the gold in women's snowboard cross after Lindsey Jacobellis of the United States fell on the second-to-last jump while performing an unnecessary method grab.
Jacobellis settled for silver (she would have won gold if she had not performed the grab), while Canada's Dominique Maltais took bronze after recovering from a crash.
[17] Kjetil André Aamodt won gold for Norway in the men's super-G on 18 February, beating Hermann Maier of Austria.
The United States men's ice hockey team suffered its first loss of the tournament as Slovakia and Russia continue their dominance of the pool.
Lascelles Brown became the first Jamaican-born competitor to win a medal at the Winter Olympics on 19 February, competing on the Canadian 2-man bobsleigh team which finished second in an extremely tight competition.
Slovakia and Finland both won their final men's ice hockey games on 21 February to win their respective pools with 5–0–0 records.
Enrico Fabris gave the host nation another gold medal in speed skating by winning the men's 1500 metres.
Chandra Crawford took a quicker route to the top of the podium, winning the 1.1 kilometre cross-country sprint gold in her Olympic debut.
In the men's ice hockey quarterfinals, the previously undefeated Slovaks lost to the Czech Republic while Russia, Finland, and Sweden eliminated Canada, the United States, and Switzerland, respectively.
Sweden and Finland won their men's ice hockey semifinal games, defeating the Czech Republic and Russia.
The Swedish men's ice hockey team handed Finland their first loss in the final to take the gold medal.
[19] Among the most important sporting facilities that were used: The most important transport infrastructure works were: In the city, the main developments were the Palafuksas, a glass building designed by Massimiliano Fuksas, the new Modern Art Gallery and the great project of the "Spina", that will provide urban regeneration over an area of 2 million square meters through the construction of an underground urban railway and the re-utilization of abandoned industrial areas.
[citation needed] During the games, Italian police raided the Austrian athletes' quarters in search of evidence of blood doping.
On 25 April 2007, six Austrian athletes (Roland Diethard, Johannes Eder, Wolfgang Perner, Jürgen Pinter, Wolfgang Rottmann and Martin Tauber) were banned for life from the Olympics for their involvement in the doping scandal at the 2006 Turin Olympics, the first time the IOC punished athletes without a positive or missed doping test.
The Austrians were found guilty of possessing doping substances and taking part in a conspiracy, based on materials seized by Italian police during the raid on the living quarters.
In 2014, the Estonian Olympic Committee was notified by the IOC that a retested sample from cross-country skier Kristina Šmigun had tested positive.
[41] It has been suggested that reasons for this lack of interest include the tape delayed coverage, which showed events in prime-time as much as 18 hours later in the Western United States.
Thanks to the olympic exposure and state of the art venues, Turin has become one of Italy's primary tourist destinations and has been established as an important sport center in Europe.