BBC Sport begins its live coverage of the 22nd Olympic Winter Games with the Opening Ceremony live from Sochi’s Fisht Stadium on Friday, February 7.
A global TV audience of hundreds of millions will see more than 2,000 performers welcome the world to Russia, which is staging an Olympics for only the second time following Moscow’s hosting of the Summer Games in 1980.
Approximately 2,800 athletes from a record 88 countries will be competing for 98 gold medals across seven winter sports, featuring 15 different disciplines.
The opening ceremony at the purpose-built Fisht Olympic Stadium gives an opportunity for the host nation to showcase its culture and achievements in what will kick start the most expensive Olympic Games ever staged.
It is sure to be an awe-inspiring spectacle which is fittingly scheduled to start at 20:14 local time (4.14pm UK time).
Sochi’s Opening Ceremony will climax with the spectacular lighting of the Olympic flame after its record-breaking journey, which included a trip into space.
Four years have passed since the last Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada, and the 2014 Olympic Winter Games are sure to create as many memories, this time from Sochi.
Russia’s festivities began with the lighting of the fabled Olympic torch at Ancient Olympia last September, which began a seven-day journey across Greece.
The torch relay began its journey in Russia from the capital city Moscow before being carried through 83 other cities on its 123-day journey.
Sochi’s Olympic flame will arrive in the city on the day of the opening ceremony, completing the longest torch relay in Olympic history, a 40,000-mile route that passed through all regions of the country, from Kaliningrad in the west to Chukotka in the east.
During its journey, the Olympic torch reached the North Pole for first time via an nuclear-powered icebreaker and also passed for the first time in space when it was carried on flight Soyuz TMA-11M to the International Space Station.
The torch returned to Earth five days later, where it went on to reach Europe’s highest mountain, Mount Elbrus, and even the depths of Siberia’s Lake Baikal.
Both the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for Russia’s first Winter Games take place at the ‘Fisht’ Olympic Stadium, located on Sochi’s brand new Olympic Park on the coast of the Black Sea.
Purpose-built for the ceremonies, spectators and television viewers alike will be able to sample the magnificent view the stadium offers of both the mountain peaks in the north and the sea in the south.
The ceremony itself promises to showcase Russia’s most talented artists and cultural achievements in a nine-part exploration of the country’s history, which will be witnessed by 40,000 spectators inside the Fisht Stadium.
As expected for such a significant national occasion, many details about the Opening Ceremony have remained a secret, though a few famous Russian performers linked include viola player Yuri Bashmet along with conductor Valery Gergiev, as well as pianist Denis Matsuev.
St Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theater ballerina Ulyana Lopatkina is also scheduled to appear, as well as some of Russia’s biggest sporting stars.
The perennial feature of any Olympic Opening Ceremony is the Parade of Nations and around 90 athletes bearing the flags of their respective nations will lead their teams out as they parade into Fisht Olympic Stadium.
Athletes will enter the stadium in an order dictated by tradition with the Greek athletes, as always, entering first, while the host nation Russia will enter the stadium last.
The names of the nations will be announced first in Russian, the official languages of the host country, followed by French and finally by English the official languages of the Olympic movement.
The nations will enter in alphabetic order of their country names in Russian, meaning the 56 athletes representing Great Britain will be the 16th in line to enter the stadium, in between the British Virgin Islands and Hungary.
He said it was “an amazing privilege to have been asked and a moment that I will treasure for the rest of my life”.
Eley takes over from Sir Chris Hoy, who carried the flag at London 2012, and Shelley Rudman who did likewise at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.
Another tradition of the ceremony is the speeches, the first of which will be given by the president of the Sochi organising committee Dmitry Chernyshenko.
He will then introduce Thomas Bach, the new president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), who will be making his first Olympic speech after succeeding Jacques Rogge in the post last year.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will then take to the stage to declare the 22nd Olympic Winter Games officially open.
The final event of the Opening Ceremony will see the spectacular arrival of the Olympic Flame and the lighting of the cauldron, which is set to provide one of the most outstanding images of the Games.
This will then signal the start of 16 days of intense sporting competition in the various mountain and Olympic Park venues.
It is hoped the Opening Ceremony will provide a peaceful start to the Games following the various political, security and organisational concerns that have somewhat marred the build up to Sochi.
WINTER OLYMPICS 2014 on the BBC – When & Where to Watch
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The BBC will broadcast the entire Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony on Friday, February 7.
Clare Balding introduces live coverage of the ceremony on BBC Two, starting at 3.30pm, where she will be sampling all the atmosphere around the Olympic Park and overlooking the Fisht Stadium.
She will be joined by various guests in the 45-minutes building up to the ceremony – which starts at 4.14pm UK time – including BBC commentators Amy Williams, Graham Bell, Ed Leigh and Sir Matthew Pinsent.
They will have their say on the British prospects for the Games as well as discuss the various issues and events that have dominated the build up to Sochi.
Once the ceremony commences, leading the BBC commentary team inside the Fisht Stadium will be Hazel Irvine alongside 1980 Olympic figure skating champion Robin Cousins and the BBC’s Moscow correspondent Daniel Sandford.
Irvine played her own part in the Sochi Games by taking part in the start of a record-breaking torch relay in Moscow back in October, where she carried the Olympic flame through the streets of the Russian capital.
She will be joined throughout the ceremony in the commentary box by various special guests.
Live coverage of the Opening Ceremony will be available to watch in high-definition on BBC Two HD and online via the BBC Sport website and app.
There will also be a chance to see the key moments from the ceremony again via BBC Red Button from 9.00pm onwards.
If you prefer to watch the Opening Ceremony without the BBC commentary, then you can do so by pressing the Red Button during the show.
Before the opening ceremony on Friday, the BBC’s live Winter Olympics coverage officially begins the day before, as for the first time in 30 years the sporting action gets under way before the Games have been declared officially open.
BBC Red Button will screen live coverage of the qualifying action from the snowboard and freestyle skiing events, plus the start of the figure skating competitions, on Thursday, February 6.
British hopes Billy Morgan and Jamie Nicholls start their bids to qualify for the slopestyle finals, which is making its Winter Olympics debut, at 6.00am.
Then at 10.00am, triple X Games gold medallist Jenny Jones and Aimee Fuller will begin their campaigns in the women’s event.
From Saturday, February 8, 16 days of unmissable winter sports action begins and the BBC will have the entire event covered on television, radio and online.
Check out Sport On The Box’s complete viewing guide to the Winter Olympics here or look out for our regular daily TV guides on the website.
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| THURSDAY 6th FEBRUARY |
| FRIDAY 7th FEBRUARY |
Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics: Opening Ceremony
Start Time: 16:14 GMT | Fisht Olympic Stadium, Sochi
.LIVE: 3.30pm-7.30pm BBC Two
Replay: 9.00pm (loop) BBC Red Button
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