Athletes from the Northwest Territories are credited with winning more than 100 ulus at the 2018 Arctic Winter Games.
The official Games medal table shows Team NT on 102 ulus in total – including 20 gold, 43 silver, and 39 bronze.
The medal tables produced by the Arctic Winter Games are rarely entirely accurate. For example, this year the total for Team NT is more likely to be slightly fewer than 100. Three snowboarding medals contained in the official list are shown as being won by an athlete who did not, in actuality, start the events in question. (We have removed them from our list, below, which consequently contains 99 ulus.)
Similarly, in 2016, the NWT’s junior male basketball team reached the final and won silver, but that result was never entered into the system used by the Games – known as GEMS – and does not show up in that year’s medal standings.
However, the medal table also allows spectators to pick out spectacular contributions to the Games, like the four golds and one silver won this year by Veronica McDonald in Arctic sports; Braeden Picek’s two individual speed skating titles alongside his contribution to a relay gold medal for Team NT; two dog mushing wins for the Beck dynasty; and a snowboarding gold medal for Ben Toner.
This year, the Northwest Territories repeated in fifth place in the overall standings – despite going from 51 ulus in 2016 to 102 (in the official tally) in 2018, double the number of podium finishes.
Why didn’t the NWT finish higher up the medal table despite such a big increase in medals? One answer is the performance of Yamal, who won just eight ulus in 2016 but took 107 two years later.
Yamal sent only four athletes to Greenland for 2016’s Arctic Winter Games, according to online records, but its team of 72 athletes in Hay River and Fort Smith proved dominant in sports like biathlon, figure skating, and table tennis.
Alberta North finished with the most ulus this year, 131, while Alaskan athletes won the most titles, taking 51 golds.
Below, we have reproduced all of Team NT’s medal winners plus those who came close to the podium in fourth and fifth place. You can click any event or athlete name to find out more on the official Arctic Winter Games results site.