Three Olympic flames burned brightly above the Bergisel Ski jump centre as Innsbruck wrote its latest chapter of Olympic history by welcoming the first Winter Olympic Youth Games.

The city's Olympic heritage bears comparison with any. They hosted the Olympic Winter Games   in 1964. Then, 12 years later, they stepped into the breach when Denver,originally chosen for the 1976 Games, pulled out after a revolt by local taxpayers.

For 1964 Innsbruck skiing medallist Karl Schranz, a member of the party which bore the Olympic flag, this Opening Ceremony must have been bitter sweet. Schranz had been disqualified from the 1972 Games in Sapporo by International Olympic Committee President Avery Brundage. He was found guilty for infringing the strict amateur regulations in force at the time. Many felt he had unfairly been made a scapegoat and when he returned home thousands thronged the airport in Vienna where effigies of Brundage were burned. Now, 40 years on,  Schranz was back in the international Olympic fold at last.

Here he was joined as Olympic flag bearer by 1976 ski jump champion Karl Schnabl and Josef Feistmantl, luge gold medallist at the 1964 Innsbruck Games and one of two cauldron lighters in 1976.


It was a challenge, but  Innsbruck struck precisely the right balance between the past and the future, even mixing traditional dances of the Tyrol with hip hop.

Two years ago Singapore pulled out all the stops in their waterfront spectacular to open the first Youth Olympic Games. Organisers of the first such ceremony for a Winter Games had nothing like their production budget and promised a more modest celebration.

Athens 2004 had used DJ Tiesto to mix a soundtrack for the entry of the athletes, here the Ceremony guides were German DJ  Bass T and a girl appropriately named " Olympia", who sat in front of computers on either side of the stage and through a giant social networking site, uploaded scenes from the  1964 Games. As the pictures flickered into life, a little grainy now,   scooters arrived carrying youngsters who danced and sang to the sounds of '64.

For Bass T this "cool" footage was the cue to upload sights and sounds linking 1964 with 1976. Back then, the Austrian crowd had roared when Franz Klammer won downhill gold in typically thrilling style. A new generation gave the same reaction when his legendary race was replayed on the giant screen. The haunting soundtrack composed by Rick Wakeman  for "White Rock," the official film of those Games filled the arena, sufficiently modern to lead seamlessly into the arrival of the teams for 2012.


The 15-year-old  skier Christina Ager had been chosen to take the traditional athletes oath and tried to commit it to memory. Halfway through her mind went blank , shades of Ed Moses at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Opening Ceremony. Ager et slip a swear word in her frustration, though like Moses, she hadn't realised that the words were displayed on the scoreboard behind her.

She wasn't the only one to forget her lines, Angelika Neuner an Olympic luge medallist who took the  oath on behalf of the coaches, also faltered, creating another unwanted moment of Olympic history.

For the climax of the ceremony however,they didn't put a foot  or for that matter, a ski wrong. The 1980 dowhill champion Leonhard Stock, an Alpine skier in one of the cathedrals of the Nordic sport, cut a dramatic figure as he delivered the flame .Another innovation saw the runners carry the flame through the ranks of spectators, before it was finally delivered to the three cauldrons.

The 1964 downhill Champion Egon Zimmerman and Klammer lit the cauldrons of their respective Games before Paul Gerstgraser, a competitor in Ski jumping at these Games, ignited the third and final bowl.

Philip Barker, a freelance journalist, has been on the editorial team of the Journal of Olympic History and is credited with having transformed the publication into one of the most respected historical publications on the history of the Olympic Games. He is also an expert on Olympic Music, a field which is not generally well known.