Today at the Games athletes will battle it out for seven sets of medals.
In the mountains, women will compete in freestyle (ski cross), slalom and biathlon (4x6 km relay). Team speed skating races will be held on the ice of Adler Arena. At Iceberg, the winners of the three sets of medals will be known in short track: women’s 1000m, men’s 500m and team race. Qualification for the Olympic final will be decided in ice hockey among Sweden, Finland, Canada and the United States, while the curling tournament comes to an end with the men’s final.
Among the contenders for gold medal in ski cross are athletes from Canada, France and Switzerland, including 2013 world champion Fanny Smith, World Cup winner Marielle Thompson, and the experienced Ophelie David.
In alpine skiing, the fight for gold is likely to unfold between the U.S. hope Michaela Schiffrin, the German Vancouver Olympic champion Maria - Hoefl-Riesch and Marlies Schild of Austria.
As is tradition, the womens' biathlon program will be concluded by one of the most spectacular starts - a relay race. The Norway national team looks to be the favorite, after its success in Sochi. However, the Belarus team, headed by the three-time Olympic champion Darya Domracheva and the Czech Republic's team, where Gabriela Soukalova will be competing having won a silver medal here in Sochi, can all make a few adjustments in the Norwegian women's plans.
In the women's speed skating team pursuit, you can count on another success for the Netherlands: their foursome - Irene Wust, Lotte van Beck, Yorin ter Mors and Marit Lenstra has already collected a significant number of medals in Sochi. In the absence of Germany's team, the gold winner in Turin in 2006 and in Vancouver in 2010, the competition will see Canada, Poland , Korea and Russia will also be competing for the awards.
In the men’s race, the Netherlands are again favorites. No athlete from the Netherlands left today’s start without a Sochi Olympic medal: Kramer took home the gold in the 5,000m and silver in the 10,000m, Blokhuijsen won silver in the 5,000m, Verweij won silver in the 1,500m and Jorrit Bergsma won bronze in the 5,000m and gold in the 10,000m. Poland and Canada could make things difficult for the team in "orange" with the golden touch.
In short track, the Russians’ hopes are in the 500m, where three quarterfinalists are from Russia: Viktor Ahn, Sochi Olympic champion in the 1,000m, Vladimir Grigoriev, who placed 2nd behind him, and Semen Elistratov. In the women’s 1,000 meters, the gold medal favorite is considered to be the strongest of the whole season, Shim Suk-Hee of South Korea.
The last part of the program in the short track is the men's 5000-meter relay finals, where the favorites are the Russians and Americans. The Canadians, who are Vancouver Olympic champions and world champions, have unluckily had to give up the fight for gold following the fall of their leader Charles Hamelin in the preliminary stage of the tournament.
The Canadian and British teams will compete for the gold medal in men’s curling, and the bronze medal match between China and Sweden will take place a little earlier in the day.
The highlight of the day will be two classic confrontations in the men's ice hockey semifinals - Sweden vs. Finland and the local rivalry of Canada vs. United States.