Didn't subside last days: Athletes, stars and ordinary fans were preparing for this grandiose sports festival. For our country, alas, this time it was overshadowed, because of which many Russian athletes, including the full athletics team, were unable to take part in the 2016 Games. But we won't. The organizers tried to do everything to please the audience and to make this Olympics, which was the first for Brazil, memorable for everyone.

Opening of the 2016 Olympic Games

The current Olympic Games are the first for South America and the second for Latin America - in 1968 the Games were held in Mexico. Rio de Janeiro has bid to host the Olympics more than once: in 1936, 1940, 2004 and 2012. Preparations for the large-scale event took several years, and the Brazilians had limited funds due to the economic crisis: for example, according to rough estimates, they spent only $20 million on the opening ceremony - this is half the cost of the ceremony in London four years ago and, according to rumored to be four times less than Beijing spent on the opening of the Games.

If 40 percent of houses in Brazil do not have sanitation, how can you spend billions on a show?

asked the Brazilian organizers.

And yet, even with such a modest budget by the standards of the world community, the Brazilians managed to put on a colorful show - with special effects, video projections, dances and songs. In total, about 35 thousand people were involved in the opening ceremony, and the television audience of the event was about four billion people!

The venue was the Maracanã Stadium, where a large-scale production took place dedicated to the history of Brazil and its future:

Athens, Beijing and London talked about the history and heroic past of their countries, and we will show what we should become in the future,

— the creative director of the opening ceremony explained shortly before the start of the Olympics.

A record number of giant LED screens and video systems, as well as the latest audio and video equipment were installed in the arena, which made it possible to turn the entire stadium into an organism pulsating in a single rhythm.

The ceremony began with the appearance of two aerial figures and a short greeting from the presenter. Dressed in all white, she gave a speech about peace and love, after which the Brazilian anthem played, played by the famous samba singer Paulinho da Viola.

Then the arena was covered green and turned into a forest: the video projection symbolized the origin of life in Brazil - first there was a forest, the basis of the country’s life, and only then people appeared.

One scene in the stadium followed another: the arrival of Europeans on ships, the appearance of Japanese immigrants who taught the Brazilians judo, the construction of megacities, the first airplane created by aviation pioneer Alberto Santos-Dumont...

Of course, one of the most highlights The appearance on the stage was amazing. The Brazilian supermodel, who conquered the world and ended her professional career, nevertheless once again appeared on the catwalk, albeit an impromptu one, to walk in front of tens of thousands of spectators.

Gisele Bundchen

The ceremony continued with the musical part: a medley of Brazilian hits from various genres. Samba, rap, folk songs- what was not there. The whole stadium sang along to some songs!

All this was accompanied by the dancing of the artists in the arena, because it is difficult to imagine Brazilian culture without dancing. They paid tribute to the Brazilian national martial art capoeira, which combines elements of dance and acrobatics and is accompanied by national music.

But all this was a prelude to main topic — environmental problems modernity, which became the central plot of the entire opening ceremony. The Brazilians decided to focus on the problems environment, directing the show, and proudly called the 2016 Games the first environmental Olympics (that's why the ceremony began with a video projection of the forest!). For Brazil, environmental problems are very acute, because massive deforestation of the jungle in the 20th century caused serious damage to the country.

But at the ceremony it was not only about Brazil, but about the fate of the entire planet - global warming, which will once and for all change the map of the world. The organizers presented this threatening picture clearly, showing how the world's oceans will wipe out countries and cities if the temperature rises another 4 degrees.

The world must unite in the face of a threat in order to preserve the planet for posterity - this was the call to humanity made by the Brazilians at the opening ceremony. And therefore, all participants in the parade of athletes this time planted tree seeds - each team was given special bags, which the athletes placed in special cabinets. From these seeds a forest will then grow: it will have 207 species of trees - exactly the number of countries taking part in the current Olympics.

The parade of athletes was opened by the Greek delegation, as always, because it was in this country that the Olympic Games originated, and Brazil closed it. It is interesting that the schedule for the appearance of teams at the stadium was unusual, not alphabetical order, to which we are accustomed. All because they started from the Portuguese language.

Each of the 207 teams was greeted with applause and shouts, but we, of course, waited. Our athletes - 250 people in total - appeared on the arena only 159th in a row.

The standard bearer of the Russian team was the legendary volleyball player and Olympic champion Sergei Tetyukhin. For other teams, the flags were carried by no less famous athletes, whose names are known to the whole world: for example, the most titled Olympian in history, Michael Phelps, became the flag bearer of the USA.

The parade of athletes lasted several hours, during which the music did not stop at the Maracana stadium. Finally, all the teams took their places, and the final part of the ceremony began.

In the arena, performers with huge mirrored cabinets lined up in the Olympic rings, which, to the amazement of the audience, opened up and suddenly turned into a real jungle - in each cabinet there was a tree. A riot of greenery engulfed the stadium, followed by fireworks.

There was still an official part ahead: after the fireworks, IOC representatives and other officials made their speeches (about the refugee team, world peace, the holiday of sports, unity and much more), who declared the 2016 Olympics officially open.

There was a touching moment: the legendary Kenyan runner Kipchoge Keino appeared at the stadium and was presented with a special award - the Olympic Laurel Branch for his contribution to the development of the Olympic movement.

Thomas Bach

Well, what next? And then the whole stadium turned into one big party: samba sounded in the arena, because 12 people appeared on the field at once best schools samba Rio. Everyone, young and old, danced. There was only one thing left to do - light the Olympic flame. This honor was entrusted to several eminent Brazilian athletes, who lit the Olympic cup. And after a few minutes it began to rise into the air, after which a sun-shaped structure hung over the stadium.

Fireworks shot into the air again. And again the stands erupted in enthusiastic shouts. The ceremony was over, but the competition had just begun. In just a few hours, the first sets of medals will be played out in Rio - we hope the Russians will be able to prove themselves!

During these three weeks of the Olympics, we will monitor the success of our team and tell you about all the most interesting things that are happening in Rio. In the meantime, we invite you to remember the last opening ceremony and look at the bright shots.

Photo Gettyimages.ru/Instagram

The Olympics moved from London to Rio. The main competition of the planet took place in August at the best sports grounds of the capital of the Brazilian carnival.

According to the decision of the 121st session of the IOC, the Games of the XXXI Olympiad or the 2016 Summer Olympics were held in the second largest city in Brazil, Rio de Janeiro. Rio competed for the right to host such a prestigious event from such global cities as Madrid, Prague, Tokyo, Chicago and St. Petersburg. The positive decision in favor of the Brazilian application was influenced by the successful experience of the previous Rio sporting event comparable scale - the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The 2016 Olympic Games were the first competition of this level on the South American continent and the second in Latin America, after the 1968 Olympics in the capital of Mexico.

The main part of the sports competitions within the framework of the 2016 Olympics took place in four clusters in Rio de Janeiro - Barra Olympic Park, Copacabana, Maracana and Deodoro. Early stages The Olympic football tournament was also held in the cities of Belo Horizonte, Brasilia, Salvador and Sao Paulo. Among the largest sports venues of the XXXI Olympics were the second largest in the world football stadium Maracana, Rio's Olympic Arena and largest Exhibition Center South America Riocentro. Competitions in beach volleyball took place on the legendary Copacabana beach, and the “carnival” Sambadromo arena hosted the athletes and archers. Despite numerous comments from the IOC regarding the delay in the construction of sports facilities, by the beginning of 2016, the Brazilian authorities managed to stabilize the situation and fulfill their previous commitments.

The logo of the 2016 Summer Olympics was a figure of three yellow, blue and green men holding hands. It reflected the colors of the national flag and became a symbol of interaction and energy, harmony in diversity, the exuberance of nature and the Olympic spirit. The winding “landscape” lines in the logo design are meant to resemble the mountains, sun and sea of ​​Brazil.

The mascot of the XXXI Olympiad, the cat-like yellow beast Vinicius, serves collectively rich fauna of Brazil. The Paralympic mascot, Tom the Walking Tree, is a reminder of the diversity of Brazil's fauna. The talismans received their names from two prominent Brazilian cultural figures - Vinicius de Morais and Tom Jobim - who created musical style bossa nova.

For the Russian Olympic team, the 2016 Games in Rio were a truly tough nut to crack. Due to international pressure in connection with "meldonium" Due to the scandal, all athletes from Russia were under threat of being suspended from participation in the main competition of the year. The thorny issue was put to rest at a meeting of the International Olympic Committee on July 24 - Russians were given the opportunity to participate in the 2016 Olympics. “ The fate of each athlete was placed under the jurisdiction of the international federation for his sport. Those admitted had to pass a control doping test in Brazil. At the same meeting it was confirmed earlier decision The IOC has suspended all Russian track and field athletes from the Rio Olympics, except for one athlete, long jumper Daria Klishina. However, a few days before the start of the Olympics, the IOC again changed its decision. The issue of participation of Russian athletes in competitions was finally decided by an independent committee of three people under the leadership of the head of the IOC medical group, Ugur Erdener. According to her verdict, 273 out of 387 members of the Russian team were allowed to participate in the Summer Olympics.

Some interesting statistics.

More than 10,000 athletes from 206 countries took part in the games of the XXXI Olympiad. Over the 17 days of competition, they competed for 306 medals in 42 sports disciplines. An innovation for 2016 was the addition of two “newcomers” to the existing Olympic sports - golf and rugby. The former returned to the roll of honor after an absence of 112 years, the latter in a somewhat simplified rugby sevens format after a 92-year hiatus. The number of spectators in the stands of the 2016 Olympics exceeded 7 million people.

Ticket prices for Summer Olympics events in Rio de Janeiro start from 40 reais (about 17.4 dollars).

The 2016 Summer Olympics will be held in Rio de Janeiro from August 5 to 26, 2016. At this time it is winter in Rio de Janeiro, the air temperature is usually 18-25C. Sports fans are waiting for a live broadcast from the competition. Time in Rio de Janeiro differs by six hours from Moscow.

Did you know which city Russia proposed to host the 2016 Summer Olympics? No, not Sochi. Saint Petersburg. A certain pattern is visible: if winter Games decided to be held in Sochi, then the 2016 Summer Olympics should be held at least in St. Petersburg, although Murmansk would be more logical.

The rules of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) do not prohibit holding two Olympic Games in a row in one country. The previous time the United States hosted the XIII Winter Olympic Games in 1980 and the XIII Summer Olympic Games in 1984 in a row (and before that, the same cities hosted the Winter and Summer Olympics in 1932). Also in one year winter and summer games hosted by France in 1924. In 1940, two Olympics were supposed to be held in Japan, but due to the war the Olympic Games were canceled. So there were chances, but as soon as the decision to hold the Olympics in Sochi became known, Russia withdrew its application. There are seven cities left.

Since September 2007, representatives of the Olympic Committee have been studying the candidate cities, and in June 2008 the first round of voting took place. Madrid, Rio de Janeiro, Tokyo and Chicago won. The cities of Doha (Qatar), Baku (Azerbaijan) and Prague (Czech Republic) received too few votes and dropped out of the competition. Another year passed, and in October 2009 Rio de Janeiro won by a majority vote. Brazilians came to vote in a representative delegation that included the famous football player Pele, the writer Coelho and the President of Brazil. The main disadvantage of Rio de Janeiro was its underdeveloped transport network: for the Olympics it was necessary to significantly expand the airports, build a transport ring around the city, and connect the Olympic venues with expressways. The country's leadership allocated billions of dollars for this purpose, significantly more than other contenders, and Brazil won. For the fifth time in the history of the modern Olympic Games, Brazil applied for the right to host the Olympics, but for the first time it was granted. The Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro will be the first Olympics on the South American continent.

In 2012, after another check of the readiness of Olympic venues, the International Olympic Committee discussed the option of moving summer olympiad 2016 to another city. The IOC Vice-President sharply criticized the preparation of sports facilities in Rio de Janeiro - sports complexes were built significantly behind schedule, and transport problems were not resolved quickly enough. Interestingly, as a result of the discussions, two alternate cities were chosen: London and Moscow. The Russian representative to the IOC confirmed its readiness to reconstruct the Olympic facilities left over from the 1980 Olympics and build new ones necessary for the new sports that appeared in the program. But this was not necessary; in 2013, the Brazilians were able to catch up with the schedule, and in the spring of 2014 the final decision was made not to move the 2016 Summer Olympics from Rio de Janeiro.

Some of the Olympic facilities were built for the 2007 Pan American Games. The arenas are divided into four clusters.

The main cluster is Barra, which houses the Olympic village, arenas for boxing, tennis, basketball, gymnastics, and a velodrome. Barra is home to the Maria Lenk Aquatic Park, which will host diving and aquatic floor competitions.

Maracana is the main stadium of the games, where the opening and closing ceremonies and football matches will be held. The Joao Havelange Complex was built close to the Maracanã, where athletics competitions will be held. The Makaranazinho, a hall for volleyball competitions, is also located there.

The water cluster - Copacabana is named after the most beautiful beach in Rio de Janeiro. It will host sailing, rowing, swimming and triathlon competitions. It is one of the largest water sports facilities in the world. The Marina de Gloria port can comfortably accommodate ten thousand spectators. The only drawback of Copacabana is its location; if a separate track is not built, athletes will have to travel from the Olympic village through the entire rather large city.

Deodoro is located near Maracanã, where competitions in fencing, equestrianism, shooting, and mountain biking will be held.

The symbols of the 2016 Summer Olympics are already known - this is the cute unknown animal Vinicius and the symbol of the revived Brazilian fauna Tom. The bright mascots of the games are painted in the traditional Brazilian colors of blue, yellow and green. These images won the popular vote, and their names were also chosen “by the whole world.”

Mini-centers will be built for journalists in each cluster.

Time left until the games less than a year, look forward to. And we wish good luck to our athletes.

In Russia, March 8 is an official holiday, an additional day off .

In general, in our country this date was declared a holiday from the moment of the widespread establishment of Soviet power, and half a century later it also became a day off. In the USSR, the celebration largely had a political context, since historically the event in honor of which the holiday was established was an important day in the workers’ struggle for their rights. And also precisely on March 8, 1917 (old style, new - February 23, 1917) from the strike of workers of St. Petersburg factories, into which the celebration of the International women's day, the February Revolution began.

International Women's Day on March 8 is a UN observance, and the organization includes 193 states. The memorial dates announced by the General Assembly are designed to encourage UN members to show increased interest in these events. However, on this moment Not all member states of the United Nations have approved the celebration of Women's Day in their territories on the specified date.

Below is a list of countries that celebrate International Women's Day. Countries are grouped into groups: in a number of states the holiday is an official non-working day (day off) for all citizens, on March 8th only women rest, and there are states where they work on March 8th.

In which countries is the holiday March 8 a day off (for everyone):

* In Ukraine- International Women's Day continues to remain an additional holiday, despite regular proposals to exclude the event from the list non-working days and replace it, for example, with Shevchenko Day, which will be celebrated on March 9.
* In Abkhazia.
* In Azerbaijan.
* In Algeria.
* In Angola.
* In Armenia.
* In Afghanistan.
* In Belarus.
* To Burkina Faso.
* In Vietnam.
* In Guinea-Bissau.
* In Georgia.
* In Zambia.
* In Kazakhstan.
* In Cambodia.
* In Kenya.
* In Kyrgyzstan.
* IN DPRK.
* In Cuba.
* In Laos.
* In Latvia.
* In Madagascar.
* In Moldova.
* In Mongolia.
* In Nepal.
* In Tajikistan- since 2009, the holiday was renamed Mother's Day.
* In Turkmenistan.
* In Uganda.
* In Uzbekistan.
* In Eritrea.
* In South Ossetia.

Countries where March 8 is a women's-only day off:

* In China.
* In Madagascar.

Which countries celebrate March 8, but it is a working day:

* Austria.
* Bulgaria.
* Bosnia and Herzegovina.
* Germany- in Berlin, since 2019, March 8 is a day off, in the country as a whole it is a working day.
* Denmark.
* Italy.
* Cameroon.
* Romania.
* Croatia.
* Chile.
* Switzerland.

In which countries is March 8 NOT celebrated?

* In the USA, the holiday is not an official holiday. In 1994, an attempt by activists to get the celebration approved by Congress failed.

* In the Czech Republic (Czech Republic) - most of the country's population views the holiday as a relic of the communist past and main symbol old regime.

August 14, 2016.

On the ninth competition day, Russian athletes won 3 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze medals.

Greco-Roman wrestler Roman Vlasov (up to 75 kg), gymnast Aliya Mustafina (uneven bars) and tennis players Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina (doubles) brought gold to Russia. Gymnast Maria Paseka (vault) and shooter Sergei Kamensky (rifle, 50 m, three positions) won silver, cyclist Denis Dmitriev (individual sprint) and yachtswoman Stefania Elfutina (“RS:X”) won bronze.

Russia has its first medal in sailing since 1996. In the “RS:X” (windsurfing) class, 19-year-old Stefania Elfutina won bronze.

Frenchwoman Charlene Picon became the Olympic champion, and Chinese Chen Payn won silver.

From the very first day, August 8, Stefania Elfutina joined the fight for medals and never lost contact with the leaders. After the first day of competition she was second, after half of the planned flights she was third, and a day later she came within one point of the regatta leader, Flavia Tartaglini from Italy. At the end of the penultimate racing day, Elfutina took the lead in the overall standings. Alas, after one of the many protests, Tartaglini received an extra point and caught up with Elfutina. And since she has a victory in one of the flights, and the Russian does not, the Italian regained the leading position.

The arrangement before the Medal Race - the “medal race”, where all points are doubled, was as follows: Tartaglini - first (55 points), Elfutina - second (55), from third to fifth places were occupied by Chinese Chen, French Picon and Israeli Davidovich (60 each). ). It turned out that in a bad situation, the Russian could have been left without medals at all, especially considering that she scored all the points due to stability, never winning a single race during the entire regatta.

Officially, the women's Medal Race in the RS:X class was supposed to start at 14:05 local time, but time passed, conflicting information was received, and nothing started. Finally at 15:35 the start was given. The wind was not strong - about 10 knots (15 is considered good). But a red flag was lit in front of Elfutina. All the competitors went into the race, and the Russian woman had just started.

“I’m very ashamed, but I still don’t understand why I was given a warning,” she told reporters after Elfutin: “I have no complaints against the judges, which means I deserved it. But what exactly happened, I don’t know right now.”

Probably only she knows that she should have risen from last, tenth, to sixth place in almost half an hour of calm, overtaking the favorite, Tartaglini, and snatching this bronze: “I just thought that I had two options: give up and wait another four years or do something anyway. And then I decided: no, four years is too long, I’ll try now.”

She was desperately “planing”, trying to accelerate and reach her far-flung rivals! Of course, it was lucky that the wind was very weak: Elfutina is good in such weather thanks to physical strength, and this allows her to keep the board “planing” much longer than her rivals (she says that she can easily do 20-25 pull-ups, but maybe more).

Absolutely, this moment will go down in the history of our sailing sport.

Based on materials from E. Slyusarenko "Championship".
Photo by Zimbio.

Aliya Mustafina is a two-time Olympic champion.

She beat her main rival, American Madison Kochian, in the uneven bars exercise by 0.067 points. Germany's Sophie Scheder won the bronze medal.

“Everything went well,” Aliya said after the performance: “Moreover, I think it was my best combination of the four made at the Olympics. It turned out cleaner than the rest. I put this combination together when I arrived here in Rio. I trained from base 6, 5, and performed from a base of 6.8. One day I came to the gym and realized that I didn’t want to perform with a simple program, that I would gather all my strength and make a complex one.

In the all-around, I did not show my maximum on three apparatuses at once - on the balance beam, on the uneven bars and in the floor exercises. But on the other hand, it would be very difficult for me to overtake the American women, only if they made mistakes it would be possible.”