Why Norway is dominating the Winter Olympics and what could US learn
By Don Riddell, CNN
(CNN) — Norway’s director of elite sport sounded a little hoarse when he answered the phone to CNN Sports. Tore Øvebrø said he had just caught a cold, but he admitted that his raspy voice might also have something to do with his cheering over the last two weeks.
“It didn’t help,” he chuckled, “I had to cheer just now because we’ve just won another gold in the Nordic Combined. We have 16, that’s the Olympic record, and we hope for a couple more. So, it’s fantastic!”
Of course, the Games weren’t done then. Norway stands on 18 golds – and 40 total medals – coming into the final day of action.
It’s now an indisputable fact: Nobody can touch Norway at the Winter Olympics. From 2018 in Pyeongchang through the Italian Games in 2026, the Norwegians have always come out on top.
A tiny nation of roughly five-and-a-half million people – about the same as the US state of South Carolina – has figured out how to keep beating countries like China (1.4 billion), the US (342 million), Germany (84 million), Italy (59 million) and Canada (40 million). Clearly, they’re doing something right, and perhaps some of their rival nations like the US could learn a thing or two from the Nordic champions.
It might come as no surprise that a Nordic country would excel in winter sports, but the truth is that Norway has been punching well above its weight in many sports for some time. Norway has recently produced Olympic champions in beach volleyball and several in track and field – two quintessentially summer sports.
Their triathlon program is celebrated as the best in the world, Viktor Hovland is one of the top golfers, Casper Ruud made it to world No. 2 in the ATP rankings, Erling Haaland is one of the most feared strikers in the “Beautiful Game” and Ada Hegerberg won the most prestigious individual honor in world soccer, the Ballon D’Or.
There are many reasons for Norway’s success, but there is one common theme: An emphasis on fun and enjoyment that starts at the grassroots level.
Until the age of 12 in Norway, nobody in youth sports is allowed to keep score, and there are no league standings either. As a result, there is far less destructive pressure and no reason to specialize too soon, and young athletes are encouraged to try out multiple sports. If one player gets a trophy, everyone gets a trophy; they want as many children as possible to return the following season.
Keeping top athletes engaged
Such a small country can’t afford to lose athletes whose talent might not be fully revealed until their later teens. Norwegian coaches don’t tend to mistake early bloomers for talented athletes.
“I find that many of the big sporting systems are more occupied with getting rid of people at the young age than develop many,” explained Øvebrø. “Why do I say that? It’s all about selection and selection is another way of getting rid of people. We are few. We have to take care of everybody.”
Haaland played in the same mixed development group of 39 boys and one girl at Bryne FK until he was 16. The group was never broken up into first, second and third teams, nobody dropped out, and a handful of those players ended up turning professional.
Johannes Høsflot Klæbo always thought he’d be a soccer player one day; in fact, he was sure of it . But he would come to realize that his true potential lay elsewhere – in Italy, he won six gold medals in cross-country skiing to become the most successful Winter Olympian of all time, his 11 gold medals surpassing three other athletes who had eight golds to their names.
All are Norwegian, by the way.
The sports development pipeline in Norway is less about trying to identify talent quickly and then turbo-charging the athletes to success, it’s more about letting them find their own way, ensuring that when they’re ready to join an elite-level program, they will make the most of it.
“When you try different sports, you also meet different cultures and that means you develop the social skills to handle different kinds of people,” said Øvebrø. “There is a broad learning base and when you have those kinds of kids, it’s easier to build a high-performance culture; they know who they are, what they want. We like the kids to feel that they are in it for themselves.”
‘It’s funny, but it’s not’
The contrast with the system in the United States couldn’t be more stark.
US comedian Josh Mancuso ridiculed the American travel baseball system, which starts at the age of 7, in a viral reel which has been seen by millions of people on Instagram.
“First tournament is a regional in South Florida,” his coach character explained. “From there, we’ll head to Costa Rica and Ecuador for two more tournaments. You’ll need bats, gloves, cleats, pants, jerseys, specialty jerseys, carts, tents, chairs, speakers. This is basically the major leagues. … It will cost $27,000 per family.”
“I think the video resonated with so many American families involved in travel sports because it’s one of those ‘it’s funny, but it’s not’ situations,” Mancuso told CNN Sports.
“Parents are smiling through the pain while spending gobs of money on tournament fees, high-end equipment and name brand swag so their 11-year old feels like a MLB All-Star. I can’t lie though, I would have loved it all when I was a little slugger.”
In every way, such programs are unthinkable in Norway, a highly egalitarian society, in which wealth and resources are distributed evenly. There are no barriers to entry in sports, nobody is priced out of participation.
Geir Jordet is the professor of psychology and soccer at the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences in Oslo. He told CNN Sports that his country’s sporting success can be summarized in three words: “Collaboration, communication and care.”
Once the elite athletes have been identified, they are helped to fulfil their potential in programs that utilize cutting edge knowledge, science and technology, including the functional use of psychology.
“The top Olympic Sports Center is 10 meters away from the Sport University where I’m currently sitting right now,” he said, emphasizing that Norway’s diminutive stature facilitates collaboration within the elite sports community.
“There’s a very strong sharing culture across sports in Norway and also from academia and from science to sport. There are very short lines of communication when it comes to knowledge. People come to that center from different sports, they meet there, they train there together, they communicate and they learn from each other.”
Putting kids first
A rising tide lifts all boats in Norway, and – whether it’s athletes, programs or sports – they cooperate with other for as long as possible, they only compete when they must.
Author Brad Stulberg, who recently published “The Way of Excellence,” is fascinated by the Norwegian approach, especially as he contrasts it with his own experience as a parent and coach in the US.
“I think that Americans could learn a lot from the Norwegian model,” he told CNN Sports, “especially the emphasis on fun and participation over winning. The data is very clear, the number one reason that kids quit sports is because it’s no longer fun. The number two reason is because they feel too much pressure.”
When Stulberg highlighted the reasons for Norway’s success in a post on Instagram, he says that some of the responses in the comments seemed to be triggered.
“So many Americans just get deeply offended by this idea,” he explained. “It’s a lot of, like, batsh*t crazy parents who feel called out because they are on the sidelines screaming at referees at their eight-year old’s baseball game. It just makes no sense; the parents need to put the kids first. It behooves us to keep sports fun, to try to release the pressure, to develop a love for sport and then keep them in sport so that later on they can be competitive.”
Tore Øvebrø says that by the age of 25, 93% of Norway’s population has been involved in some kind of organized sports. Conversely, the American Academy of Pediatrics reported in 2024 that 70% of youth athletes drop out of organized sports by the age of 13 – injury and burnout are the principal reasons why.
“Discontinuation of sports during childhood plays a role in the more than 75% of adolescents in the United States who fail to meet physical activity recommendations,” said the report.
The-CNN-Wire
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