LAGO DI TESERO, ITALY — Before he became the most famous dog at the Olympics, Nazgul was not known as an escape artist. Still, his owners, Enrico and Alice Varesco, were not taking chances when they left him alone at their apartment alongside the Olympic cross-country ski trails this week.

Austrian bobsled pilot Jakob Mandlbauer was taken off the course in a stretcher and subsequently hospitalized after his nearly 1,500 pound bobsled overturned during a Saturday, February 21, run at the 2026 Winter Olympics.

The 2-year-old local pup who made his own bid for gold has become a household name

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — The two-man bobsled competition at the Milan Cortina Olympics is four runs over two days, the same format the event has used for nearly a century. Germany's Johannes Lochner might have ended this year's event in exactly 54.

Humans being pulled along on a sled across picturesque, snow-covered landscapes by a group of agile, energetic dogs is an image that won’t be seen at Milan Cortina in 2026, but the practice of sled dog racing does have Olympic history.