By The Numbers: A look at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics

MILAN (AP) — The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics officially started on Friday, with the opening ceremony and the lighting of the cauldrons.

And these Games are particularly supersized.

These are the first Olympics to fully embrace cost-cutting reforms installed by the International Olympic Committee, and use mostly existing venues — which has meant scattering the Games all over northern Italy.

Here’s a look at some of the key numbers ahead of the opening ceremony:

The number of new sports at these Games. Ski mountaineering — also know as skimo — is making its Olympic debut. The sport combines uphill sprinting (on boots and on skis) and downhill skiing.

That's how many times Italy has hosted the Winter Olympics previously: in Cortina d’Ampezzo in 1956 and Turin in 2006. Italy has held the Summer Games once, in Rome in 1960.

The number of locations for events in the most spread-out Winter Games ever. Ice sports will take place in Milan and women’s Alpine skiing, curling and sliding events in Cortina — the two main hubs. But there will also be competition in Bormio, Livigno, Predazzo, Tesero and Anterselva, and the closing ceremony will take place in Verona.

Number of Russian athletes set to compete as neutral individuals along with seven Belarusians. They are not allowed to compete under their national flag or anthem and cannot take part in the opening ceremony athlete parades.

The number of days of competition.

The age difference (in years) between Team USA's oldest athlete at the Games and its youngest. Curler Rich Ruohonen will set a Team USA Winter Olympic record at age 54, while the youngest member of the team is 15-year-old freeskier Abby Winterberger.

Lindsey Vonn's age at her fifth Olympics after making a sensational return to ski racing. If she wins what would be a fourth Olympics medal she would edge France’s Johan Clarey — who was also 41 when he claimed downhill silver in 2022 — to become the oldest Olympic Alpine skiing medalist ever.

How old San Siro turns this year. The stadium that will host the opening ceremony will be knocked down in the next few years after a new arena is built next to it.

The number of medal events at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics. If that sounds like a lot, it's not even close to the Summer Games. There will be more than 350 medal events at the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.

The number of athletes competing at the Milan Cortina Games. The United States will have the largest presence with 235 athletes — the largest ever U.S. Winter Olympics team. Host nation Italy will have 196.

That's how many volunteers will be helping out at the Games. About 900 of them will be working behind the scenes at the opening ceremony.

AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

The sun sets over the mountains and the Livigno Valley prior to the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games opening ceremony in Livigno, Italy on Friday, Feb. 6, 2026. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press via AP)

Japan's Goshin Fujiki poses for a photo in front of the Olympic rings at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy, Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

United States' Lindsey Vonn concentrates ahead of an alpine ski, women's downhill official training, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Trovati)

Milan Cortina 2026 is projected on the facade of a building in front of the Duomo gothic cathedral, in Milan, Italy, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

An athlete skis past Olympic rings during a cross country training session at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Tesero, Italy, Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic senators pressed the U.S. government’s top intelligence official at annual worldwide threats hearings Wednesday about the war with Iran, including whether she had advised President Donald Trump that Tehran was likely to block the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial passageway for oil and gas from the Persian Gulf, if attacked.

Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, repeatedly deflected questions about the intelligence she had offered the Republican president. That exasperated Democrats who tried to use a rare public forum to extract answers about the widening conflict in the Middle East.

She sidestepped when asked by Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, whether she had advised Trump that Iran would attack Gulf nations and shut down the strait if the country was targeted by U.S. strikes.

“I have not and won’t divulge internal conversations. I will say that those of us within the intelligence community continue to provide the president with all of the best objective intelligence available to inform his decisions,” she said.

Trump has urged allies to help safeguard the waterway and ease a chokepoint on the region’s oil exports. He complained on Tuesday that NATO and most other American allies have rejected his calls.

The annual congressional hearings involving the most senior intelligence officials are taking place at a time of scrutiny over the U.S. military campaign in the Middle East and heightened concerns about terrorism at home after recent attacks at a Michigan synagogue and Virginia university.

The focus was on the war, and among the issues expected to be raised was reporting that outdated intelligence likely led to the U.S. firing a missile that hit an elementary school in Iran and killed more than 165 people. The outdated targeting data was reported to have come from the Defense Intelligence Agency, whose director, Lt. Gen. James H. Adams, was to testify. The White House says the strike is under investigation.

The hearings, which continue in Thursday in the House, are also likely to delve into the administration's internal debate over the war, given the resignation this week of Joe Kent as director of the National Counterterrorism Center. Kent said Tuesday he could not “in good conscience” back the war and did not agree that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States.

Hours later, Gabbard, whose office oversaw Kent’s work, wrote on social media that it was up to Trump to decide whether Iran posed a threat. She did not mention her own views of the strikes and asserted at the outset of the hearing that she intended to deliver the perspectives of the intelligence agencies, as opposed to her own viewpoints.

Trump has sought to distance himself from Kent. CIA Director John Ratcliffe tried to do the same Wednesday when he was asked whether intelligence supported Kent's assessment that Iran was not an imminent threat.

"“The intelligence reflects the contrary,” Ratcliffe said.

Apart from Iran, Gabbard was pressed on her presence at an FBI search in January of an election hub in Fulton County, Georgia, where agents seized voter data from the 2020 presidential election. Her appearance at a domestic law enforcement operation raised eyebrows given that Gabbard's office is meant to focus squarely on foreign threats.

Warner said it was “an organized effort to misuse her national security powers to interfere in domestic politics and potentially provide a pretext for the president’s unconstitutional efforts to seize control of the upcoming elections.”

Gabbard responded that she was present for the search at the request of the president but did not participate. But she continued to tangle with Warner, who at one point told her: “If you want to ask the questions, you should have stayed in Congress."

Also under scrutiny is Kash Patel's leadership of the FBI. He was making his first public appearance on Capitol Hill since video surfaced last month showing him partying with members of the U.S. men's hockey team after their gold medal win at the Winter Olympics.

Patel has fired dozens of agents in his first year on the job, raising concerns about an exodus of national security experience at a time when the United States is confronting an elevated terrorism threat.

This month alone, a gunman wearing clothes with an Iranian flag design and the words “Property of Allah” killed two people at a Texas bar; two men who authorities say were inspired by the Islamic State group were arrested on charges of bringing homemade powerful explosives to a protest outside the New York City mayoral mansion; a man with a past terrorism conviction opened fire inside an Old Dominion University classroom in Virginia; and a Lebanese-born man in Michigan drove his car into a synagogue.

The FBI has said that it is working continuously to protect the country.

Associated Press writers Mike Catalini and Ben Finley contributed to this report.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe testifies during the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

FBI Director Kash Patel listens during the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

From left, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams III, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and Acting Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command William Hartman, listen during the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

From left, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Acting Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command William Hartman, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe are seated before the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard testifies before the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Acting Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command William Hartman, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe are seated before the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

From left, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Acting Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command William Hartman, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe stand before the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

From left, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Acting Commander of the U.S. Cyber Command William Hartman, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe are seated before the Senate Committee on Intelligence hearings to examine worldwide threats on Capitol Hill Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

FBI Director Kash Patel takes part in a U.S. Hostage and Wrongful Detainee Flag Raising ceremony at the State Department, Monday, March 9, 2026 in Washington. (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)