History
Fast Facts
Host City: Grenoble, FranceOpening date: Feb. 4, 1968
Closing date: Feb. 18, 1968
Nations: 37
Athletes: 1,158 (947 Men, 211 Women)
35 events in 8 sports
Grenoble was almost as surprising a choice as Squaw Valley had been in 1960. Although located in the Alps, it was primarily an industrial city, not a resort. Organizers spent more than $240 million to turn it into a suitable site for the Winter Olympics, including construction of a stadium solely for the opening ceremonies.
The sports venues were widely spread out. Only skating was actually contested in Grenoble. Other facilities were as much as 43 miles away and athletes were dispersed among seven different Olympic villages.
French President Charles de Gaulle led the opening ceremonies, which featured parachutists using smoke to draw the Olympic rings in the sky and helicopters dropping pape flowers to the crowd.
The International Olympic Committee agreed to let East and West Germany compete as separate teams for the first time. East Germany had been trying to gain separate status in the eyes of the IOC since the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961.
France's Jean-Claude Killy emerged as the popular hero of the 1968 Games, winning gold medals in all three Alpine skiing events. The handsome and charming Killy won the downhill and giant slalom with relative ease, but appeared to have been beaten by Austria's Karl Schranz in the slalom. However, Schranz was disqualified for missing a gate after extensive study of videotape by officials.
Another popular winner was bobsledder Carlo Monti of Italy. The winner of nine world championships, the 39-year-old Monti had previously won four Olympic medals, two silver and two bronze, but had no gold to his credit. In Grenoble, he won two, in the two- and four-man events, and then announced his retirement.
Figure skater Peggy Fleming was the only U. S. gold medalist. But three American women, Jennifer Fish, Dianne Holum, and Mary Meyers finished in an incredible dead heat for the silver medal in 500-meter speed skating.
Athletes had to undergo drug testing after each event. Everyone passed, but the women's luge team from East Germany was found guilty of illegal heating sled runners to gain faster times and members were stripped of gold and silver medals.
