Recently, many athletes have reflected on the situation of medals at the 2026 Winter Olympics being chipped, cracked, or damaged just a few minutes after the award ceremony.
Regarding the above incident, the Olympic organizers said they would open an emergency investigation.
At a press conference on February 9, the CEO of Milano Cortina - Andrea Francisi informed: "We have grasped the situation and are investigating the cause of this incident. Medals are extremely important to athletes, so we will pay the highest attention to ensure everything is perfect.
The organizers believe that the medal incident is likely related to the strap. The strap is designed with a self-deploying mechanism to ensure safety for the wearer in case of strong pulling. Therefore, when athletes celebrate, it will lead to the medal falling off the strap and being damaged.
Previously, the American downhill skiing champion - Breezy Johnson informed that her medal was cracked and broken, the ribbon broke as soon as she left the podium.
“I jumped out of joy, then the medal suddenly fell,” Johnson recounted.
Field skier Ebba Andersson (Sweden) also encountered a similar situation, the medal was separated from the ribbon, fell into the snow and broke in half.
Meanwhile, figure skating star Alysa Liu (USA) shared on Instagram about the ribbon and gold medal in the bronze event falling off her strap.
Not only the 2026 Winter Olympics, at the Paris 2024 Olympics, the organizers had to replace more than 200 medals because the quality was not guaranteed. The above number corresponds to about 4% of the total number of medals awarded at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
