The policy that started it
The turning point traces back to Calgary 1988, the first Winter Olympics at which Norway won no gold medals at all. The shock prompted two responses that Norwegian sport treats as connected. The year before Calgary, in 1987, Norway's sport governing body had already adopted a framework now known as Children's Rights in Sports, a national set of guidelines that bans competitive scoreboards, standings and rankings for children below age eleven and prohibits national competitions for anyone younger than 13. The stated goal is idrettsglede, loosely translated as the joy of sport, with the philosophy that children should help decide how and how much they participate rather than being sorted into winners and losers before adolescence.
