The Olympics online

After much anticipation, the Winter Olympics will debut tomorrow in Salt Lake City. Now it's time to bask in the excitement of the upcoming winter competitions. The Web is the perfect place to find schedules for the games that will continue until Feb. 24, as well as exclusive interviews with athletes, spectacular photos and Olympic history and trivia.

Salt Lake 2002, the official site of the 2002 Olympic games at www.saltlake2002.com, not only lists a calendar of events by sport, date and venue, but provides brief biographies of the athletes, accompanied by audible comments from them. A special section for kids includes a coloring book, puzzles and a look at the 2002 Olympic mascots—the hare, coyote and bear. Visit the shopping section to purchase official licensed merchandise.

The official site of the Utah Travel Council includes additional information on scheduled events at www.utah.com. Click on "winter preview" for a photo tour of Utah and daily reports of snow accumulation. Additional links to statistics and Olympic world records can be found at www.freepint.com/gary/olympicreference.html.

Olympic news as it happens can be found on Yahoo at http://dailynews.yahoo.com/fc/ysports/2002_Winter_Olympics/ and on the CBS network at www.sportsline.com/u/olympics/2002. Both sites contain complete news coverage, photos and a list of related Web sites. For a mix of sports, art and culture, visit the Olympic Museum at www.museum.olympic.org/. The museum features the historical significance of the games, including a biography of the founder of the modern Olympics, Pierre Frédy, Baron de Coubertin. Its unique online exhibitions and virtual gallery enable visitors to relive the history of the Olympic movement.

And for you trivia buffs, it's time to prove you're not the weakest link and that all the hours you have spent watching ESPN haven't been wasted. Simply hop on any search engine, such as Google www.google.com, type in "Olympic trivia," and you'll be introduced to a plethora of trivia contests on the Web. You'll be asked such challenging questions as, "Do you know what the five colored, interlocking rings on the Olympic flag represent?"

Even if you can't make it to Salt Lake City this year, the Internet provides plenty of opportunities to partake in the excitement of the Winter Olympic Games.

—Stewart Brower and Laura Taddeo, University Libraries