As the Milano-Cortina Winter Games begin, all eyes are on the 3,000 athletes representing 92 countries. The 2026 Winter Games will be the most gender-balanced Winter Olympics in history, with women making up 47% of athletes, and the program will include 50 women’s events.
Female participation at the Winter Olympics has moved at a glacial pace. Ski jumping was off-limits to women as recently as the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and was introduced four years later at the Sochi Olympics.
The overhaul of the cross-country skiing distance is the most recent change. For the first time in Olympic history, men and women will race the same distances across all events at Milano-Cortina.
Throughout the 17 days of the 2026 Winter Olympics, these athletes will compete in 15 sports, hoping to make their nations proud. But one sport remains off-limits to women, despite campaigns to include it as an event: Nordic Combined.
Nordic Combined has a rich Olympic history. Since the first Winter Games in 1942, the sport has tested the bravery and endurance of athletes in ski jumping and cross-country skiing.
However, the women’s event only had its first world championship in 2021. Just 10 nations took part in the tournament, with Norway sweeping the three medals.
International Olympic Committee sports director Kit McConnell pointed to too-small audiences and a lack of “diversity of countries” taking part.
“It’s fair to say that it has struggled on both counts,” McConnell said at a news conference.
In June 2022, talks were underway to include women in the Milano-Cortina Winter Games; American skier Annika Malacinski remembers them well.
“Then the decision came: ‘no.’ No explanation, no discussion. Just ‘no,’ and then they moved on to the next topic,” she told The Associated Press from her training base in Norway.
The decision was made by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) executive board, which has twice as many men as women in a 10-5 split.
Malacinski is one of dozens of women who have sacrificed time and money to pursue Olympic gold in Nordic Combined and who might now have to shift their focus to ski jumping or cross-country skiing to extend their careers.
“How could they? How dare they?” asked Malacinski, who has American-Finnish dual citizenship and competes for the U.S. “The time and effort I have put into building this sport with so many amazing girls around the world, and for the IOC to tell us that we are not enough? Disgusting.”
“And for the Olympics to brag about how equality has never been at its highest days before this decision? Shameful,” Malacinski added. “We’re hearing your message loud and clear, and know that you’re on the wrong side of history today. The fight has just begun.”
Malacinski is a frequent top-10 finisher in elite Nordic Combined competitions. Her younger brother, Niklas, will represent the United States in the men’s event.
“It’s bittersweet. I know how hard he works, and he absolutely deserves it,” Malacinski said in an interview with CBC. “I do the same sport as him. I jump the same ski jumps and ski the same courses. The only difference is that I’m a woman.”
The long-term future of Nordic Combined at the Olympics is in doubt, with no commitment to keep the men’s event in 2030 unless the IOC sees a larger global audience and more countries sending athletes.