2002 Winter Olympics The cost and cost overrun for Salt Lake City 2002 compares with costs of US$2.5 billion and a cost overrun of 13% for Vancouver 2010, and costs of US$51 billion and a cost overrun of 289% for Sochi 2014, the latter being the most costly Olympics to date. Average cost for Winter Games since 1960 is US$3.1 billion, average cost overrun is 142%. A total of 78 National Olympic Committees sent athletes to the 2002 Olympics. Cameroon, Hong Kong (China), Nepal, Tajikistan, and Thailand participated in their first Winter Olympic Games. The 2002 Winter Olympics featured 78 medal events over
Winter Olympic Games of Calgary hosted the first Winter Olympics to span three weekends, lasting for a total of 16 days. New events were added in ski-jumping and speed skating, while future Olympic sports curling, short track speed skating and freestyle skiing made their debut appearance as demonstration sports. The speed skating events were held indoors for the first time, on the Olympic Oval. Dutch skater Yvonne van Gennip won three gold medals and set two world records, beating skaters from the favoured East German team in every race. Her medal total was equalled by Finnish ski jumper Matti Nykänen, who won all