Future Winter Games Could Start in January

Staging future Winter Games as early as January and the Paralympic Winter Games in February is a possibility because of the effects of warmer weather, the International Olympic Committee said Wednesday. Moving to January would likely disrupt scheduling of storied World Cup races and events, and the competitions then would more directly clash with NFL and NBA schedules, the AP reports. Every Winter Games medal has been won in February since the 1964 Innsbruck Olympics. The IOC is now reviewing Olympic Games issues in the first year of Kirsty Coventry's presidency, and changing the winter edition dates to catch more snow and lower temperatures is an option, per the CBC.

"Maybe we are also discussing to bring the Winter Olympics a little bit earlier," the IOC member overseeing the sports program review, Karl Stoss, told reporters, "to do it in January because it has an implication for the Paralympics as well." The Milan Cortina Paralympic Winter Games will be held March 6-15. The IOC acknowledged under Coventry's predecessor, Thomas Bach, that the changing climate complicates finding future hosts and organizing competitions. "(March) is very late because the sun is strong enough to melt the snow," said Stoss, whose home country Austria is historically a power in Alpine skiing and ski jumping.

"Maybe the Paralympics will be in February and the other edition will be in January. That would also be a part of our discussion," he said on the sidelines of the IOC's eve-of-Olympics meeting in Milan. The 100-plus IOC members should meet again in June to make decisions about the Olympic reviews and whether to add new sports and events to the 2030 French Alps Winter Games. The French Alps edition is currently expected to run Feb. 1-17, and the 2034 Utah Winter Games are Feb. 10-26.