Beyond the Podium: What you need to know about Sochi today

WATCH: It’s official the winter Olympics are now underway after an opening ceremony full of Russian culture and heritage. Allison Vuchnich reports.

Friday

Friday was the official kickoff of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.

Opening Ceremony – The ceremony featured an extravagant look at Russia’s history and an elaborate fireworks display after the Olympic cauldron was officially lit by Russian hockey legend Vladislav Tretiak and three-time gold medallist figure skater Irina Rodnina.

It also had a noticeable glitch, when a digital display of five snowflakes was supposed to grow into the five Olympic rings. One of the snowflakes failed to expand, leaving four interlocked Olympic rings and one lone snowflake sitting next to them.

Downhill Skiing – After the first training run of downhill skiing got under way on Thursday, the men and women took to the slopes again on Friday in the second training run. The event saw some Canadians improve on their results from the previous day, while others saw a slight setback.

Erik Guay actually shaved 0.4 seconds off his Thursday time. But the field was much faster overall and Guay placed 15th after finishing seventh on Thursday.

Manuel Osborne-Paradis showed the greatest improvement of the men, jumping to 20th after a 42nd-place finish on Thursday. Ben Thomsen jumped two spots from 38th to 36th, while Jan Hudec experienced the greatest drop, going from 24th to 38th.

On the women’s side, rising star Marie-Michèle Gagnon improved on her Thursday run where she had a disappointing 46th place finish. She jumped to 22nd on Friday.

The most noteworthy Canadian run was Larisa Yurkiw‘s, unfortunately for the wrong reasons. Yurkiw aggravated a strained shoulder and sprained her ankle during her run on Friday and could not finish. Doctors allowed her to go to the opening ceremonies and she still plans on competing in the downhill, Super G and combined skiing events next week.

Saturday

Saturday is the real start of the Olympic Games, the first action-packed day as well as the day on which the first medals will be awarded.

Medal Events:

Snowboard Slopestyle 

• The men’s slopestyle semi-final, which features Canadians Charles Reid and Mark McMorris, starts Saturday at 9:45 a.m. local time (12:45 a.m. ET / 9:45 p.m. Friday PT). Reid and McMorris will need to crack the top four of the 21-person field to reach the finals.
• The final is at 12:45 p.m. local time (3:45 a.m. ET / 12:45 a.m. PT). Canadians Maxence Parrot and Sébastien Toutant have already clinched a berth in the finals. Reid and McMorris hope to make it four Canadians in the slopestyle final, where Canadians have a real shot at sweeping the podium.

Cross-Country Skiing

• The women’s 15-kilometre skiathlon gets underway at 2 p.m. local time (5 a.m. ET / 2 a.m. PT). Amanda Ammar, Emily Nishikawa and Brittany Webster are the Canadian competitors in the event.

Speed Skating

• The long track speed skating men’s individual 5000-metre starts at 3:30 p.m. local time (6:30 a.m. ET / 3:30 a.m. PT). Mathieu Giroux is Canada’s lone competitor in the event.

Biathlon

• The men’s 10 km Sprint event takes place at 6:30 p.m. local time (9:30 a.m. ET / 6:30 a.m. PT). There are four Canadians to watch for: Nathan Smith, Brendan Green, Jean-Philippe Le Guellec and Scott Perras.

Freestyle Skiing

• The women’s moguls medals will be awarded on Saturday, with the second qualification run scheduled for 6 p.m. local time (9 a.m. ET / 6 a.m. PT). No Canadian competitors will be featured in this event because all four women representing Canada in the sport already clinched their spot in the final on Thursday in the first qualification run.
• The final begins at 10 p.m. local time (1 p.m. ET / 10 a.m. PT). It provides a good chance for at least one, possibly two Canadians to land on the podium. Chloe, Justine and Maxime Dufour-Lapointe are all competing along with teammate Audrey Robichaud.

Women’s hockey

In the most notable non-medal event, Canada’s women’s hockey team takes the ice for their first game against Switzerland at 5 p.m. local time (8 a.m. ET / 5 a.m. PT).

Figure skating

The team figure skating event, which started on Thursday, resumes on Saturday.

• Ice Dance Short Program @ 6:30 p.m. local time (9:30 a.m. ET / 6:30 a.m. PT). Scott Moir and Tessa Virtue will skate for Canada.
• Ladies’ Short Program @ 8:10 p.m. local time (11:10 a.m. ET / 8:10 a.m. PT). Kaetlyn Osmond will skate for Canada.
• Pairs Free Skate @ 10:05 p.m. local time (1:05 p.m. ET / 10:05 a.m. PT). Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford will complete their second program for the team event, as they competed on Thursday as well.

Luge

The first two runs of the men’s individual luge competition take place on Saturday.

• Run 1 @ 6:30 p.m. local time (9:30 a.m. ET / 6:30 a.m. PT).
• Run 2 @ 8:40 p.m. local time (11:40 a.m. ET / 8:40 a.m. PT).
• Samuel Edney, John Fennell and Mitchel Malyk are the three athletes representing Canada in men’s luge.

Ski jumping

Ski jumping gets underway, with the qualification round of the men’s normal hill competition, which goes at 8:30 p.m. local time (11:30 a.m. ET / 8:30 a.m. PT). Matthew Rowley, Trevor Morrice, Dusty Korek and Mackenzie Boyd-Clowes are all competing for Canada in the event.

Downhill skiing

The third downhill skiing training runs go for both men and women on Saturday.

• The women take the hill at 10 a.m. local time (1 a.m. ET / 10 p.m. Friday PT).
• The men follow an hour later at 11 a.m. local time (2 a.m. ET / 11 p.m. Friday PT).

Overall, most of the Canadian focus will be on slopestyle snowboarding, where Parrot, Toutant and McMorris are all legitimate podium contenders, and on women’s moguls, watching all three Dufour-Lapointe sisters go for gold.