After eight years in the Olympic wilderness, moguls racer Junko Hoshino is back in the red and white of Japan at the Beijing Games and set on having a much more memorable experience.
Japan s Ikuma Horishima had a disappointing first showing at the Beijing Winter Olympics on Feb. 3, the two-time world champion missing out on earning a direct place in the men s moguls finals with a loose qualification run.
cited ski industry report. it might sound like a lot, but that s less than 1% of the country s total population. like most winter sports here, skiing is growing fast. but so far lacks mass appeal. which is why this might seem surprising. beijing will host the next winter olympics in 2022 in a country with little winter sports tradition. but lots of olympic experience. in 2008, china put on a show at the summer olympics in beijing. come 2022, you ll see some of those same venues retrofitted for the cold events. three different areas host it all, not without their problems. start in mountainous where they have halfpipe and ski moguls. to do that you need snow. and nearly all of it on this mountain is made by machines. but organizers say there is plenty of fake snow to go around. so the focus is on building out competition sites. we have to have everything ready by 2020. right.
the schedule was packed today. among the events, the men s ten kilometer bobsled event, the women s 7.5 kilometer skiathlon and women s free style ski moguls. we are going to brian shactman. he is there with the latest on the events. i hear, brian, you were at the women s hockey match today. how was it when team usa beat finland? was it fun? reporter: very impressive. people have been asking about a vibe. are there a lot of empty seats? the place was 08% full. in terms of americans, family of the players. will were athletes of other sports there. a as a matter of factoring of fans. the finn fans were louder. any time they took the puck into tend that s loudest it got the entire game. finland is considered basically the third best team in the tournament with the united states and canada being the top would and the rivals for gold here. the finns have a goalie who is