1976 Summer Olympics

Games of the XXI Olympiad
Emblem of the 1976 Summer Olympics
LocationMontreal, Canada
Nations92
Athletes6,073 (4,813 men, 1,260 women)
Events198 in 21 sports (27 disciplines)
OpeningJuly 17, 1976
ClosingAugust 1, 1976
Opened by
Cauldron
StadiumOlympic Stadium
Summer
Winter
1976 Summer Paralympics

The 1976 Summer Olympics (French: Jeux olympiques d'été de 1976), officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad (French: Jeux de la XXIe Olympiade) and officially branded as Montreal 1976 (French: Montréal 1976), were an international multi-sport event held from July 17 to August 1, 1976, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Montreal was awarded the rights to the 1976 Games at the 69th IOC Session in Amsterdam on May 12, 1970, over the bids of Moscow and Los Angeles. It was the first and, so far, only Summer Olympic Games to be held in Canada. Toronto hosted the 1976 Summer Paralympics the same year as the Montreal Olympics, which still remains the only Summer Paralympics to be held in Canada. Calgary and Vancouver later hosted the Winter Olympic Games in 1988 and 2010, respectively. This was the first of two consecutive Olympic games held in North America, followed by the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid.[2]

Twenty-nine countries, mostly African, boycotted the Montreal Games when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) refused to ban New Zealand, after the New Zealand national rugby union team had toured South Africa earlier in 1976 in defiance of the United Nations' calls for a sporting embargo due to their racist apartheid policies. The Soviet Union won the most gold and overall medals, with the Eastern Bloc having seven countries in the top 10 of the medal table.

  1. ^ a b "Factsheet - Opening Ceremony of the Games of the Olympiad" (PDF) (Press release). International Olympic Committee. October 9, 2014. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 14, 2016. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  2. ^ "List of Upcoming Olympics Games till 2034: Check Host Country, Venue and Other Details". Jagranjosh.com. August 13, 2024. Retrieved August 15, 2024.