Lake Placid

(1) Lake Placid is a village in the Adirondack Mountains in  New York in the United States with a population of 2,638 people.

Lake Placid is best known as the two-time site of the Winter Olympics in 1932 and 48 years later in 1980.

 Lake Placid, St. Moritz in Switzerland, and Innsbruck in Austria are the only sites to have twice hosted the Winter Olympic Games. 

(2) The 1932 Winter Olympics, officially known as the III Olympic Winter Games, were the 1st Winter Olympics held in the United States. The games opened on February 4 and closed on February 15. Seventeen countries participated.



The most notable highlights of the Games.

Jack Shea, a resident of the village, became the first person to win two gold medals when he doubled in speed skating at the 1932 Winter Olympics. He carried the Olympic torch through Lake Placid in 2002 shortly before his death.[4] His grandson, Jimmy Shea, competed in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah in his honor, winning gold in the Skeleton.

The USA won the medal tally with a total of 12 medals (6 gold, 4 silver, and 2 bronze).



(3)The 1980 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XIII Olympic Winter Games, was a multi-sport event which was celebrated from 13 February through 24 February 1980. 

This was the second time the Upstate New York village hosted the Games, after 1932. 

The mascots of the Games were "Roni" and "Ronny", two raccoons. The mask-like rings on a raccoon's face recall the goggles and hats worn by many athletes in winter sports.

The most notable highlight of the Games involved the United States men's ice hockey team. The team was not predicted to advance beyond group play. They won the gold medal, defeating the heavily favored Soviet team and Finland in the medal round and became known as the "Miracle on Ice" in the US press. A film about the event, called Miracle, was released in 2004.

Other notable highlights included:

Lake Placid 1980 marked the first use of artificial snow in Olympic competition.

Ulrich Wehling of East Germany and Irina Rodnina of the USSR won their respective events for the third time.

Aleksandr Tikhonov of the USSR earned his fourth straight gold medal.

Nikolay Zimyatov of the USSR earned three gold medals in cross-country skiing.

Eric Heiden of the United States won 5 gold medals in speedskating (500m, 1,000m, 1,500m, 5,000m and 10,000m), setting 4 Olympic records and 1 world record (10,000m) in the process. Heiden was the first to win 5 individual gold medals at one Winter Games.