Wanderlust Ice & Ink — Travel: Italy, On Site at the Olympic Games, Milan–Cortina 2026. (c) Sarahaerial.ice
The 2026 Winter Olympic Games, officially known as the XXV Olympic Winter Games, are taking place from February 6 to 22, 2026 in northern Italy, within an unprecedented multi-city format centered on Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. These Games mark the return of the Winter Olympics to Italy twenty years after Turin 2006 and represent the fourth Olympic edition hosted by the country. Unlike previous editions concentrated in a single host city, Milan Cortina 2026 is spread across several territories between Lombardy and the Dolomites. Milan is primarily hosting ice sports such as figure skating, speed skating, and ice hockey, while mountain events are taking place in Cortina, Bormio, Livigno, and other Alpine venues.
In total, 116 medals are being contested across sixteen winter disciplines, including alpine skiing, biathlon, Nordic combined, bobsleigh, curling, luge, and skeleton, as well as ski mountaineering which makes its official debut on the Olympic program. The competition schedule began two days before the Opening Ceremony, with several preliminary events starting on February 4, ahead of the official launch at Milan’s San Siro Stadium on February 6. Nearly 90 nations are represented and thousands of athletes are competing for medals, records, and historic moments for their countries.
Between vertiginous races in the Alps and artistic performances on Milanese ice, these Games aim to celebrate both the heritage of winter sport and its contemporary evolution within a deeply Italian cultural and aesthetic framework.
In total, 116 medals are being contested across sixteen winter disciplines, including alpine skiing, biathlon, Nordic combined, bobsleigh, curling, luge, and skeleton, as well as ski mountaineering which makes its official debut on the Olympic program. The competition schedule began two days before the Opening Ceremony, with several preliminary events starting on February 4, ahead of the official launch at Milan’s San Siro Stadium on February 6. Nearly 90 nations are represented and thousands of athletes are competing for medals, records, and historic moments for their countries.
Between vertiginous races in the Alps and artistic performances on Milanese ice, these Games aim to celebrate both the heritage of winter sport and its contemporary evolution within a deeply Italian cultural and aesthetic framework.
My Journey In Milano Cortina
I didn’t arrive in Milan all at once. I stopped first in Turin, crossing France and sliding through Switzerland along the way, watching the landscape change through the train window. Mountains slowly appeared on the horizon, vast, luminous, almost theatrical in their scale, and then there it was: Mont Blanc, cutting through the sky like a silent witness to my journey. Snow, cliffs, clouds brushing the peaks, tunnels disappearing into the rock. The ride felt less like transportation and more like a slow cinematic sequence leading me toward Italy and the Olympics.
Turin carried a different mood. Heavier, more historical, more reflective. Walking through its wide boulevards and grand squares, I could feel the imprint of the 2006 Winter Games still lingering in the architecture, the monuments, the urban rhythm. It was calm, dignified, and strangely groundin, like a reminder of where winter sport had once taken center stage in this country.
Then came Milan.
From the moment I arrived, I chose to walk. I wanted to feel the city before analyzing it, to let it reach me before I reached for words. And immediately, something was different. You could sense that the Games were beginning. Flags everywhere. Giant screens. People gathering in piazzas. Temporary ice rinks. Street performers. Tourists, volunteers, athletes, journalists, families, kids with painted faces, all sharing the same air of anticipation. It wasn’t just festive; there was a tension rising, that particular Olympic electricity where celebration and competition collide. Milan didn’t feel like a simple host city. It felt like a city already in conversation with the Games. And of course, I came here for figure skating.
Not as a competitor, but as a professional skater shaped by years of performing on international stages and on ice, and as a writer trying to understand what skating means today, and grateful as a simple tourist watching the sport I love the most, beyond medals and rankings. What surprised me most is that when I arrived, the Olympic story had already begun. Before the Opening Ceremony, the figure skating team events were already underway. The Games had quietly started, not with fireworks, but with blades on ice, scores appearing on screens, and the first emotions already unfolding.
For a few days, I simply wandered through Milan.
Duomo, hidden streets, cafés, galleries, modern architecture, historic courtyards. I observed how the city dressed itself for the Olympics while still remaining unmistakably Milanese, elegant, precise, stylish, confident. I will write separate articles about all these visits — the places, the art, the atmosphere, the culture, the fashion, as part of this Travel, Italy series. But before that, I want to begin where my heart is: figure skating.
Turin carried a different mood. Heavier, more historical, more reflective. Walking through its wide boulevards and grand squares, I could feel the imprint of the 2006 Winter Games still lingering in the architecture, the monuments, the urban rhythm. It was calm, dignified, and strangely groundin, like a reminder of where winter sport had once taken center stage in this country.
Then came Milan.
From the moment I arrived, I chose to walk. I wanted to feel the city before analyzing it, to let it reach me before I reached for words. And immediately, something was different. You could sense that the Games were beginning. Flags everywhere. Giant screens. People gathering in piazzas. Temporary ice rinks. Street performers. Tourists, volunteers, athletes, journalists, families, kids with painted faces, all sharing the same air of anticipation. It wasn’t just festive; there was a tension rising, that particular Olympic electricity where celebration and competition collide. Milan didn’t feel like a simple host city. It felt like a city already in conversation with the Games. And of course, I came here for figure skating.
Not as a competitor, but as a professional skater shaped by years of performing on international stages and on ice, and as a writer trying to understand what skating means today, and grateful as a simple tourist watching the sport I love the most, beyond medals and rankings. What surprised me most is that when I arrived, the Olympic story had already begun. Before the Opening Ceremony, the figure skating team events were already underway. The Games had quietly started, not with fireworks, but with blades on ice, scores appearing on screens, and the first emotions already unfolding.
For a few days, I simply wandered through Milan.
Duomo, hidden streets, cafés, galleries, modern architecture, historic courtyards. I observed how the city dressed itself for the Olympics while still remaining unmistakably Milanese, elegant, precise, stylish, confident. I will write separate articles about all these visits — the places, the art, the atmosphere, the culture, the fashion, as part of this Travel, Italy series. But before that, I want to begin where my heart is: figure skating.
Milano Figure Skating Olympic Games 2026
Olympic Flame In Milano. (c) Sarah B
In the next articles, I will first summarize and analyze the figure skating competitions, starting with what I witnessed at the arena and on screens around the city.
I will cover:
the Men’s Short Program,
the Men’s Free Skate,
the Women’s Short Program,
the Women’s Free Skate,
All these event, I'm gonna see them live.
Each competition will not only be treated as sport, but as art, performance, and cultural moment, what these skaters say about the direction of contemporary skating, its risks, its beauty, and its contradictions.
This first article is simply about arriving. Arriving physically in Italy, arriving emotionally at the Olympics, and arriving intellectually at the place from which I will observe these Games, as both skater and journalist. The next text will return to what I saw tonight: the Men’s Short Program, and what this first competition revealed about modern skating, its brilliance, its pressure, and its atmosphere.
For now, Milan feels like a threshold: between my past on the ice, my present as a professional, and my growing role as a storyteller of this sport. This is where the Italian chapter truly begins.
I will cover:
the Men’s Short Program,
the Men’s Free Skate,
the Women’s Short Program,
the Women’s Free Skate,
All these event, I'm gonna see them live.
Each competition will not only be treated as sport, but as art, performance, and cultural moment, what these skaters say about the direction of contemporary skating, its risks, its beauty, and its contradictions.
This first article is simply about arriving. Arriving physically in Italy, arriving emotionally at the Olympics, and arriving intellectually at the place from which I will observe these Games, as both skater and journalist. The next text will return to what I saw tonight: the Men’s Short Program, and what this first competition revealed about modern skating, its brilliance, its pressure, and its atmosphere.
For now, Milan feels like a threshold: between my past on the ice, my present as a professional, and my growing role as a storyteller of this sport. This is where the Italian chapter truly begins.