The Tokyo Olympics were set to take place in Tokyo, Japan, from July 23 to August 8, 2021. The event, which was originally slated to take place from July 24 to August 9, 2020, was postponed in March 2020 because of the COVID-19 epidemic, and would now be held largely behind closed doors with no spectators allowed under the state of emergency. The Summer Olympic Games will be held for the second time in Japan in 2020, with the first being held in Tokyo in 1964, making Tokyo the first city in Asia to host the Summer Games twice. Meanwhile, the Winter Olympics will be held in Beijing in 2022. The Winter Olympics will be staged in Beijing for the first time in 2022.
Even for the top athletes, qualifying for the Olympics, let alone winning a medal, is a lifetime achievement. Professional athletes, on the other hand, exist on a whole other level, capable of winning competitions as diverse as bobsledding and sprinting. Winning transcends even the seasons in which elite athletes compete in the Olympic Games for those great athletes. According to Today, at least 128 of the world's fastest and strongest athletes have attempted to win both the Summer and Winter Olympics. Only five competitors have ever won medals at both Olympic Games in the history of the games. Let's have a look at them.
1. Eddie Eagan (USA)
Eddie Eagan was a boxer and bobsledder from the United States who holds the distinction of being the only person to win gold medals in both the Summer and Winter Olympic Games. Summer gold in boxing and winter gold in four-man bobsled went to Eagan. In the 1920 Antwerp Olympic Games, he won gold in light-heavyweight boxing. Eagan joined the United States bobsled squad for the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid more than a decade later.
2. Jacob Tullin Thams (Norway)
Jacob Tullin Thams, a Norwegian ski jumper and sailor, won the first Winter Olympics in 1924 in Chamonix, France, and became the first ski jumping champion. Thams also won the individual large hill at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Lahti in 1926, and he was awarded the Holmenkollen medal. In 1936, Thams returned to the Olympic Games for the Summer Games. For his efforts as part of the Norwegian sailing crew, he was awarded a silver medal.
Also Read | Most medals in Summer Olympic Games history
3. Christa Luding-Rothenburger (East Germany & Germany)
Christa Luding-Rothenburger of Germany is the only athlete to have won medals in both the Summer and Winter Olympics in the same year, a feat that is no longer feasible due to the Olympic years being staggered. Luding participated for East Germany before the German reunification in 1990, and then for Germany afterwards. She was one of the top speed skaters in the world for more than a decade. She won two world titles in speed skating at the World Sprint Championships. After winning gold in the 500-metre speed skating event in 1984, Luding-Rothenburger won silver in the same event in 1988 and gold in the 1,000-metre event. At the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, Luding-Rothenburger won a silver medal in the match sprint cycling event. She went on to win a bronze medal in speed skating at the 1992 Albertville Winter Games.
4. Clara Hughes (Canada)
Clara Hughes won two bronze medals in the 1996 Summer Olympics and four medals in three Winter Olympics (one gold, one silver, and two bronze). She and Cindy Klassen are the two Canadians with the most Olympic medals, each with six. Hughes was the first Canadian woman to win an Olympic medal in road cycling, winning two in Atlanta in 1996. Hughes is one of just five persons to have placed on the podium in both the Winter and Summer Olympics, and the only person to win multiple medals in both.
5. Lauryn Williams (USA)
At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Lauryn Williams earned a silver medal in the 100-metre dash. As a member of the 4100 women's relay team at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, the sprinter won a gold medal. Williams and Elana Meyers won silver in the two-woman bobsleigh competition at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Williams is one of just five athletes to win a medal in both the Summer and Winter Olympics, and the first American woman to do it.
Also Read | List of athletes with most Olympics appearances
