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Bored by Biathlon? The Winter Games Need Ping-Pong.

25 0
18.02.2026

The overwhelming majority of people in the world either don’t know or don’t care that the Winter Olympics are under way in Milan Cortina. But it doesn’t have to be that way. There are plenty of globally popular indoor sports—from ping-pong to martial—that are easy to play on a snowy day. Why not balance out the games and bring some of these to the Winter Olympics?

Something needs to change. The panjandrums at the International Olympic Committee might want you to think the Games are going very well. Viewership for the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics appears to have bounced back from the dismal numbers that plagued Beijing 2022. NBC reported a 34 percent increase in U.S. opening ceremony viewers, while European broadcasters posted record audiences in France, Norway, and Italy. The IOC boasts that its own polling showed 90 percent of international viewers approved of the opening ceremony. And that includes viewers in India, Indonesia and Mexico.

The overwhelming majority of people in the world either don’t know or don’t care that the Winter Olympics are under way in Milan Cortina. But it doesn’t have to be that way. There are plenty of globally popular indoor sports—from ping-pong to martial—that are easy to play on a snowy day. Why not balance out the games and bring some of these to the Winter Olympics?

Something needs to change. The panjandrums at the International Olympic Committee might want you to think the Games are going very well. Viewership for the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics appears to have bounced back from the dismal numbers that plagued Beijing 2022. NBC reported a 34 percent increase in U.S. opening ceremony viewers, while European broadcasters posted record audiences in France, Norway, and Italy. The IOC boasts that its own polling showed 90 percent of international viewers approved of the opening ceremony. And that includes viewers in India, Indonesia and Mexico.

But look closer and those figures aren’t especially impressive. Much of the rebound of viewership in........

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