What are winter sports?

Winter sports are normally played during winter season. Formally, these sports are played on snow and ice. Some of the winter sports are played round the year such as Basketball. These are informal winter sports. Winter sports are quite different from the normal sports. These are normally the games take place in snowy area. The places may be on the hill tops are artificially created one.

The main winter sports are Ice hockey, Figure skating, Snow-blading, Mono skiing, Skoal, Tobogganing, and Snowmobiling. Other common winter sports include Alpine and Nordic Skiing, Snowboarding, Sledding events such as Luge, Skeleton, and bobsleigh.

Some of the winter sports are included in Winter Olympics and some are not. There are also some games which are included in some Olympics and not in other Winter Olympics.

There are several sports included in Winter Olympics Turin 2006 in individual and team categories. These are as follow:

Individual categories:

Ice skating:

Figure skating, Short-track Speed skating and Speed skating were included in Ice skating category.

Skiing

Alpine skiing, Biathlon, Cross country skiing, Freestyle skiing, New school skiing, Nordic combined and Ski jumping were included in Turin Olympics as Skiing events.

Sledging:

Bobsled, Luge and Skeleton were played as Sledding.

Snowboarding:

Alpine snowboarding, Boarder cross, Freestyle snowboarding and Slalom were the winter sports included as Snowboarding games in the winter Olympics.

Team sports:

Curling and Ice hockey.

There are some winter sports not included in the Winter Olympics. These are as follow:

Ice skating

Synchronized skating

Skiing
Ski archery, Ski-boarding, Skibob, Ski-joring, Snowshoe, Speed skiing and Telemark skiing were not included in Turin Olympics.

Sledding:

Air-board, Dogsled racing, Ice Blocking and Wok racing were also not found their places in the Winter Olympics Turin 2006.

Snowmobiling:

free style, snow-cross. Recreation, cross country and hill climbing in snowmobiling category were not included in Winter Olympics Turin 2006..

Team sports

Some of the team sports are played and enjoyed but not included in the Winter Olympics such as Bandy, Broom ball, Ringlet and Ice stock sport. Snowball fight is also a popular winter sport. Snowman building is popular among children and who build the highest one become the winner. Though Sledge hockey was not included in Winter Olympics it was included in Winter Paralympic Sport.

Recreational sports

People especially children enjoy some of the winter sports on casual basis. Building snowmen, Ice boating or sailing, Ice swimming, Shinny, Snowball fight and Tobogganing are some of them.

There are many places and regions for winter sports. Canada is one of the best country for winter sports. Canada has already hosted two Winter Olympics and preparing for third one in Vancouver.

 Winter Olympics 2010 will be held in Vancouver, Canada.

Few of Winter sport regions:

Alps, Andes, Appalachian Mountains, Kashmir and Manali (India), Balkan Mountains, Carpathian Mountains, Karkonosze Mountains, Sudeten mountains, Lapland, Rocky Mountains, Snowy Mountains, Swiss Alps and Whistler are some of the Winter Sports regions.

Large number of winter sports events are organized all over the world especially in the snowy areas. Winter Olympics organized every four years are the most important of those. Some other notable Winter sporting events are Winter Paralympic Games, Asian Winter Games, Winter Universiade, Winter Dew Tour etc.