Olympic fans have created a popular petition that could save the future of a sport set to be cut following the 2026 Winter Olympic Games.
The 2026 Winter Olympic Games officially ended on 22 February following two weeks of excitement and drama, with Team GB leaving Italy with a total of five medals, including three golds.
Perhaps more so than any other year, sports fans tuning in to the Olympics were exposed to a variety of sports that they would have otherwise been completely unaware of.
Curling was the biggest winter of the Games, with the men's Curling team taking home silver in the final against Canada the most watched event of the Olympics, with 5.5 million Brits tuning in on BBC One to watch the match.
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But there is one slightly more niche sport that is now at risk of being removed from the Winter Olympic Games, prompting fans to create petition that could save the event.
For the first time since the debut Winter Games in 1924, Nordic combined events were a part of the Milan Cortina Games this year.
Perhaps unsurprisingly Norway took gold in all three event, with the same countries standing on the podium at all three Nordic combined events.
Because of this lack of competition and the small TV audience that the events attracted, it has been reported that the International Olympic Committee are is considering scrapping it from future Games.
Nordic combined involves athletes doing a daredevil ski jump to determine the starting order before a brutal cross-country ski race.
It is also the only winter Olympic sport that doesn’t include women, something that athletes who compete on the World Cup tour and in world championships have come together to try and change ahead of the 2030 Games.
Several female athletes who compete in Nordic Combined attended the men's events this year, including U.S. team skier Annika Malacinski who cheered for her younger brother while protesting women's exclusion.
The protests have since moved online, with a petition on Change.Org asking to include Women's Nordic Combined approaching 30,000 signatures at the time of writing.
Of course, the fate of women hoping to compete in the Nordic Combined events in the 2030 Winter Olympic Hames will only be able to do so if the IOC decide to stick with the sport for the future.
“If it stays, it’s for both,” said Lasse Ottesen, the Nordic combined director of the International Ski Federation.
“It makes no sense to say, ‘Yes, we’re just going to have the Nordic combined men in or, yes, we’re going to take the men out and we’re going to throw the women in.’ I mean why would anyone do that in these times?”
As it stands, it's unclear when exactly a decision will be made about the future of the Nordic Combined events, but it is believed that the topic will be revisited in the near future now that the 2026 Games have wrapped up.
Ben McCrum