As the Winter Olympic Games finally get underway, find out about the Polish team and how you can follow the action over the next two weeks.

The Polish Winter Olympic team may have walked out to empty seats at China’s National Stadium, also known as the Bird’s Nest, but it did not dampen the excitement back home at the prospect of the next 16 days. The team of 57 athletes, boasting 27 men and 30 women across 10 sports is Poland’s 3^rd biggest representation at a winter games.

Snowboarder Aleksandra Król and Zbigniew Bródka led the team out into the stadium as joint flagbearers. Sport and superstition tend to go hand in hand, and this Games will be no different, as commentators in Poland have already discussed the “curse of the flagbearer”. This so-called “curse” has seen no Polish athlete who was flagbearer at a Games return with a medal. Whilst this year’s athletes will want to buck the trend, history is not on their side.

Poland’s record medal haul from a winter Games was achieved in Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014, winning a total of only 6 medals on both occasions. Hope for an improved tally this year has been tempered as data company Gracenote have released their pre-Games virtual medal table predicting that Poland will not win any medals in Beijing. However the unpredictable nature of the last two years, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, paves the way for unexpected results.

The effects of the pandemic will still have a great impact on these Games, and could create a real risk of the “flagbearer’s curse” becoming a reality. Bródka should have been joined by fellow speed skater Natalia Czerwonka, who was originally announced as joint flagbearer. A positive Covid-19 test meant she was replaced by Król, and is now left in a race for recovery to be on the starting line for the women’s 1500m this Monday.

This is a race which has defeated short track speed skater Natalia Maliszewska. Officials confirmed the current European and former World silver medallist today would not compete in tomorrow’s women’s 500m event, due to a positive Covid-19 test. Provided Maliszewska can recover in time, she will still be eligible to race in the women’s 1000m, 1500m, and 3000m relay events.

T5HN will be covering this, and all the other events with a ‘Pekin to Beijing’ –  our daily round-up of all the action from our Polish athletes. We will also be updating the site with athlete profiles, interviews and opinions over the next two weeks. Be sure to follow us on Twitter and get notified of our latest post.