1976 Winter Olympics elections. Whistler would go on to be associated with neighbouring Vancouver's successful bid for the 2010 games. Salt Lake City offered to host the games, but the IOC, still reeling from the Denver rejection, declined and selected Innsbruck to host the 1976 Winter Olympics, which had hosted the 1964 Winter Olympics games twelve years earlier, on 5 February 1973. Salt Lake City would then host the Winter Olympics in 2002. The mascot of the 1976 Winter Olympics was "Schneemann", German for "snowman", a snowman in a red Tyrolean hat. Designed by Walter Pötsch, Schneeman was purported to represent the 1976
2010 Winter Olympics Olympics, and broke the record for the most medals won at a single Winter Olympics with 37, a record held up to then by Germany in 2002 with 36 medals. Athletes from Slovakia and Belarus won the first Winter Olympic gold medals for their nations. The Canadian Olympic Association chose Vancouver as the Canadian candidate city over Calgary, which sought to re-host the Games and Quebec City, which had lost the 2002 Olympic bid in 1995. On the first round of voting on November 21, 1998, Vancouver-Whistler had 26 votes, Quebec City had 25 and Calgary had 21. On December