The , officially known as the '''XIII Olympic Winter Games''', were celebrated in
1980 in
Lake Placid, New York ,
United States Of America . Another candidate city was
Vancouver -
Garibaldi ,
British Columbia ,
Canada ; they withdrew before the final vote.
- An upstart United States '', was released in 2004.
- This was the Second Time the Games were held in Lake Placid.
- First use of artificial snow in Olympic competition.
- Although they did not get any medals, The People's Republic Of China returned to the Olympics Games after the IOC agreed to designate the ROC " Chinese Taipei ".
- Ingemar Stenmark won both the giant slalom and the slalom.
- Hanni Wenzel won the women's giant slalom and slalom, making Liechtenstein the smallest country to produce an Olympic champion.
- Ulrich Wehling of East Germany and Irina Rodnina of the USSR won their respective events for the third time.
- Aleksandr Tikhonov of the USSR earned his fourth straight gold medal.
- Nikolay Zimyatov of the USSR earned three gold medals in cross-country skiing.
- Eric Heiden won all 5 Speedskating Events (500m, 1,000m, 1,500m, 5,000m and 10,000m) he also set 4 olympic records and 1 world record (10,000m).
- Robin Cousins won gold for Great Britain in the men's ice skating
- The winner of the games was the USSR with 10 golds, 6 silvers and 6 bronze; East Germany had a higher overall medal count but fewer gold.
See the medal winners, ordered by sport:
''(Host nation highlighted)''
