After much huffing and puffing over the length of the ski run in Nagano where conservationists wanted to keep it away from a wildlife sanctuary adjacent to the site, the Winter Olympics finally get under way this week.

Interest will focus on the Irish Bobsleigh team which is made up of a number of international track and field athletes. Terry McHugh, Irish javelin champion, Jeff Pamplin, international sprinter, Peter Donohoe, international hurdler, Simon Lincheid, international hammer thrower and Gary Power an international discus thrower will take part in the games.

It will be McHugh's fifth Olympic Games. He has competed three times in the summer games and this will be his second winter games.

Paul Patrick Schwarzacher-Joyce will be Ireland's only other competitor in the downhill skiing event.

Nagano lies further south, and closer to the equator, than any of the previous Winter Olympics hosts. Perhaps this is why it occasionally rains rather than snows.

Three events make their Olympic debut in Nagano - curling, snowboarding and women's ice hockey.

Professionals from the National Hockey league (NHL) will compete in the Olympics for the first time in Nagano.

The bobsleigh and luge track to be used for the Games is the only one in the world with two uphill sections.

Figure skating was twice included in the Summer Games (1908 and 1920) before a separate Winter Games was founded. Ice hockey also featured in the 1920 Summer Olympics.

Around 2,400 athletes from 72 nations are expected to compete in Nagano - both records. The previous highest figures were 1,808 athletes at the 1992 Albertville Games and 67 nations in Lillehammer in 1994.

The youngest gold medallist is Kim Yoon-mi of South Korea who was 13 years 83 days when she helped win the short-track relay title in 1994.

The oldest gold medallist is American Jay O'Brien, who was a week short of his 49th birthday when he won the four-man bob in 1932.

Italy's flamboyant Alberto Tomba became the only Alpine skier to successfully defend an Olympic title when he won gold in the giant slalom in 1992.