Team USA arrives in Ital athletes’ villages : NPR

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MILAN — Cory Thiesse, a curler from Minnesota, wasn’t sure what to expect when she arrived at her new digs in the athletes’ village in Fiames, part of Cortina d’Ampezzo competition cluster, for the Olympic Games. “We arrived at the village at night and you could kind of see the mountains around you,” she says.

“But opening the door that first morning — we are really in the middle of the mountains living. It’s amazing,” she says.

Her mixed doubles curling partner, Korey Dropkin from Massachusetts, says the ski resort town Cortina, surrounded by dramatic mountain peaks, is stunning. “It’s picturesque no matter where you are or where you go,” he says.

Olympic athletes are arriving in northern Italy and moving into Olympic villages spread among the four competition clusters around the region. Each village has beds for athletes and support staff, gyms for working out, laundry facilities, medical help and a cafeteria, where athletes have been passing on trays of steamed cauliflower and peas in favor of the pasta.

Hockey players, speedskaters and figure skaters are based in a more urban setting, at the Olympic Village in Milan. Figure skater Ilia Malinin, from Virginia, is at the Olympics for the first time. “It’s so cool going into a cafeteria and seeing so many team jackets,” he says. “I really never imagined [seeing] so many athletes of different sports and different kinds being in the same area.”

There are hints of nature in the city setting, says Madison Chock, an ice dancer from California, like an athlete lounge that’s designed like a greenhouse. “You can just go in there and relax and listen to calming music. And then you can also take a little plant back to your room and feed it and water, sunlight,” she says. “I was pleasantly surprised that we could foster plants in the village — it was a nice little touch.”

Snowboarders are posted in a mountain town called Livigno, near the border with Switzerland, where the pizza has been popular. Lily Dhawornvej, from Colorado, says she ate seven slices of pizza for dinner one night. “That’s all I’ve been eating,” she says.

Her big air and slopestyle teammate Hahna Norman, from California, is doing her part. “I, too, smashed a pizza with Anna Gasser last night,” she says, referring to the two-time Olympic champion from Austria. “Post-big air practice, we all got together in the food hall and played cards and ate pizza. …The carbo load is going great.”

Big air and slopestyle teammate Jess Perlmutter, from New Jersey, says she’s smashed two pizzas herself, but she’s also branching out. “I’ve had the best pasta I’ve ever had here, and I had gelato last night,” she says, adding that it’s all been gluten-free, per her dietary restrictions. “Italy’s like one of the best places for gluten free food — surprisingly so,” she says.

The snowboarders agree: They’ve been having a sick time.