IRINA TRAVELING - Official Web Site - Winter entertainment and sports in Russia.

If the winter in Russia falls snowy, it generates a lot of entertainment for both children and adults. Temperatures can range from -5 to -30 degrees, but hard frosts don’t last long. It’s time for winter fun.

From any slope, a slide is arranged, from which it is great happiness to go on sledges and tubes (round sleds). It is especially fun to organize a “train”, connecting several sleds together. Sometimes all this construction falls in the middle of a roller coaster, arranging a bunch of Malu that quickly slides down, which brings a lot of joy to children. Special routes are organized in the parks.

You can make a snow angel. For which you must drop into the fluffy snow and make a movement with your arms and feet until the outline of the angel appears in the snow.
Of the traditional sports, hockey can be highlighted.

In many yards there are hockey rinks, which for the winter are poured with water, FREEZING , forming an ice rink. Goals are put up for the goalkeepers, and boys from all the neighboring houses come to play. Often, they have a trainer as well.
There are also professional teams that train on indoor courts at any time of the year. The game is based on ice skating, participants from 2 teams with sticks chase the puck, trying to take it away from each other and trying to get it into the enemy’s goal. Competitions between yards are often held. Traditional ice hockey appeared in Russia in 1946, in 1954 Russia became world champion and in 1956 it won Olympic gold.

Ice skating is also one of the favorite pastimes.
There are professional dancers who perform at ice figure skating championships. Figure skating originated in the 19th century, when cities began to prepare special places for skating. The first ice rink appeared in St. Petersburg in 1865. In 1920 the first competitions were held. In 1926 the first figure skating sessions appeared.

Speed skating appeared in 1889 in Moscow, in the form of the Union of Russian skaters, the first Championship was held there and since then it has been held annually. Ski slopes are arranged for skiing in the parks and outside the city. Skiing originated in 1896 in Moscow and the first cross-country skiing competition in Russia was organized over 3 km.

In the yards, children build snow forts and have a snowball battle (they roll snowballs and throw them at each other). They sculpt snowmen. They insert carrots to make the nose and instead of the hands a stick.

Public tracks are organized in the city. They have a heated dressing room, where you can change, leaving personal things in custody. You can rent skates or come with your own. The skate sharpening service works. To slide well, the blades of the skates must be well sharpened, there is beautiful lighting on the rink and the music plays modern melodies. Rural parks also organize skating rinks framed by the forest and lighting, just like ski slopes.

The traditional Ice Sculpture Festival is also celebrated, on the chosen theme. In St. Petersburg, in 2006, a Palace made of ice was built as entertainment of the 18th century. Also in the ice fireplace, ice droaves were burning, on the ice table there were dishes and fruits.

Nowadays ski resorts are gaining more and more popularity, where you can snowboard and ski off the slope. Athletes jump to ski from snow springboards. The first trampoline appeared in 1906 in St. Petersburg, with a height of 12 meters. In 1940, a 70-meter snow trampoline was built, on which a 82-meter ski jump was made. In 1968 he won the first Olympic medal in the 90-meter ski jump.

The first snowboard competitions were held in 1995. It is a board with leg bindings designed for descending a snowy mountain. It resembles a skateboard and is controlled identically. The first snowboard came to Russia in 1988, initially the athletes were engaged only in slalom – a mountain descent with a detour of flags. As of 1992, the development of freestyle began with the realization of various figures.

The elevator helps to climb the mountain, there are seats, there is a forklift, which is a handle, which only needs to be held, and it will drag you up the mountain.

The most famous ski resorts in Russia are in Sochi, the Caucasus, Khibiny, Sakhalin, etc. In the vicinity of St. Petersburg, there are also slopes for skiing even in the “Ohta Park”, where there is also the most beautiful skating rink in the forest with magical illumination.

Since 1980 bobsleigh began to develop in Russia – an Olympic sport that is a mountain descent on a special ice track on guided bobsleds. At that time in the USSR there was a race for medals, it was necessary to develop new sports. In the words of General Secretary Brezhnev:”for those who were the first to fly into space, nothing can be impossible”, the Bobsleigh Federation was established. Until 1985 the athletes trained in Germany, since there were no tracks in Russia. In 1984 the first gold medals were won.

The winter of Roux, despite the frosts, gives a lot of fun and joy. Fights in the snow fortress, ice skating and skiing, hockey and competitions. Now there are artificial indoor ice rinks that allow skating at any time of the year, but nothing compares to a real winter ice rink in the forest or park, when with red cheeks you run along the ice or the ski slope. The peculiarity of cold weather leaves no choice and children from childhood get used to winter sports, grow up healthy, confident and perhaps future athletes.

There are also biathlon competitions (skiing + shooting) and curling (competitions in which a heavy object is thrown on the ice, with the aim of reaching the final point faster than the enemy, pushing him along the way)