Winter Olympics closing ceremony celebrates Italian athletes and art at ancient Roman amphitheater

He Milan Cortina Olympic Games ended Sunday with a closing ceremony inside the Verona Arena, an ancient Roman amphitheater that sits roughly halfway between the remote mountain, valley and city venues that made these the most widespread Winter Games in Olympic history.

The two and a half hour ceremony celebrated Italian music and dance, both classical and contemporary, and headlined internationally acclaimed ballet dancer Roberto Bolle along with popular Italian singer Achille Lauro and DJ Gabry Ponte.

Some 1,500 Olympic athletes, just over half of those who competed in the Games, paraded before the monument built in the 1st century for gladiator fights and the hunting of exotic animals.

They filed in behind a pair of flag bearers from each of the 92 participating nations, including biathlete Lisa Vittozzi and speed skater Davide Ghiotto of hosts Italy, and hockey player. Hilary Caballero and ice dancer Evan Bates for the United States: all gold medal winners.

The United States deployed its bigger Winter Olympics team ever for the Milan Cortina Games 2026with 232 athletes competing and broke the record for most Team USA gold medals in a single Winter Games. The United States was one of only two countries to compete in all 16 sports disciplines, along with host Italy, according to the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee.

“These Games showcased the best of Team USA: resilience, unity and a relentless pursuit of excellence,” USOPC CEO Sarah Hirshland said in a statement. “Our athletes turned in a truly historic performance, winning a Team USA record 12 gold medals and creating moments that will inspire the next generation… That momentum now carries us forward as we look toward Los Angeles in 2028, where we are excited to build on this legacy and welcome the world to our homeland.”

Some 12,000 spectators joined the athletes and officials at the closing ceremony. It was much more intimate than the opening ceremony, starring Mariah Carey and Andrea Bocelli inside Milan’s San Siro football stadium, which was attended by more than 60,000 people.

The ceremony celebrated Italian lyrical opera, which has been recognized by the United Nations cultural agency UNESCO as a world treasure, but also paid tribute to contemporary Italian classics. Both opera and dance are at home in the stone amphitheater, which each summer hosts a popular opera festival with lavish productions and the dance gala Roberto Bolle and Friends.

Part of the ceremony included a somber remembrance of the athletes who died, although the commemoration, filled with images of butterflies, did not identify specific athletes.

At the start of the 2026 Winter Games, the International Olympic Committee kept Ukrainian athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych out of competition after he rejected a last-minute request from the IOC not to wear a helmet that honors athletes killed in Russia’s war against their country. According to the IOC, the helmet goes against a rule about making political statements on the Olympic playing field.

“No one, especially me, disagrees with the message. It is a powerful message, it is a message of remembrance, of memory,” said IOC president Kirsty Coventry. told reporters at the time, according to the Reuters news agency. “The challenge was to find a solution for the pitch.”

These were the first Games for two-time Olympic swimming champion Coventry, who oversaw the ceremony alongside Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

One of the key moments of the ceremony is when the Olympic flag is handed over to the host country of the next Winter Games, France, and its flag is raised alongside those of Italy and Greece.

The Milan Cortina Games spanned an area of ​​8,500 square miles, from ice sports in Milan to biathlon in Anterselva on the Austrian border, men’s snowboarding and downhill in Valtellina on the Swiss border, cross-country skiing in Val di Fiemme north of Verona and women’s downhill, curling and sliding sports in co-host Cortina d’Ampezzo.

It is a model that will be maintained for future Games, to avoid the expense of constructing new facilities. The 2030 Winter Games in the French Alps will host events in the Alps and in Nice on the Mediterranean Sea, while speed skating will be held abroad at a location to be decided.

The closing ceremony concluded with the extinguishing of the Olympic flames in two unprecedented cauldrons in Milan and Cortina, which can be seen via video link. A light show will replace fireworks, which are not allowed in Verona, to protect the animals from possible disturbances.

A total of 116 medal events have been held in eight Olympic sports across 16 disciplines, including the debut of ski mountaineering this year, over the course of 17 days of competition.

The opening ceremony of the Milan Cortina Paralympic Games will also take place at the Verona Arena on March 6, and the Games will run until March 15.