When Johannes Strolz of Austria won the men's alpine combined at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, it caused a sensation. The 29-year-old almost wasn't included in the national team for the Games but more extraordinarily, he replicated the feat his father Hubert Strolz had managed 34 years earlier in Calgary.

This marked the first time in Olympic history that a parent and child both won gold in the same discipline at the Winter Games. But it wasn't the first time that siblings, cousins or other relatives landed on the podium at the Olympics.

Especially with winter sports, where love of skiing or skating is often passed down through generations, it is not rare for several members of the same family to compete at different levels. 

Still, for two or more relatives to reach the very pinnacle of their sport is significant enough to make headlines. And this happened more than a few times at the Beijing Games.

The reason they race

In the men's biathlon 10km sprint, gold medalist Johannes Thingnes Boe of Norway was joined on the podium by his older brother Tarjei Boe who won bronze – the first time two siblings shared a podium in an individual biathlon race.

They repeated this when they won gold in the mixed relay and men's relay, this time standing on the same step of the podium together. Tarjei also added silver in the 12.5km pursuit to his tally, while Johannes Thingnes won gold in the 15km mass start and bronze in the 20km individual.

"He is the reason I started in this sport. He is the reason why I sit here today in first place," Johannes Thingnes said of his older brother after the 10km sprint, adding he was "so proud."

"Now he sits here with this Olympic bronze medal, and it's like gold for him. I know he's been fighting for this Olympic medal for so many years."

Cross-country also had its pair of top-performing siblings. Finland's Iivo Niskanen won a full set of Olympic medals at the Beijing Games: gold in the 15km classic, silver in the men's team sprint and bronze in the skiathlon. Older sister Kerttu Niskanen added to this silver in the women's 10km classic and bronze in the 30km mass start free. The pair had previously won medals in Sochi and PyeongChang.

"It seems these tracks are really good for us, and also high altitude... We both have always been really good in this kind of conditions when it's thin air and slow conditions of the course," said Iivo, revealing perhaps part of the secret that makes siblings so successful: training in the same conditions so that they are more likely to overcome similar obstacles. 

'We're even!'

For Strolz, matching his father's alpine combined gold medal clearly wasn't enough. He also took home silver in the slalom, where his father won silver in the giant slalom in 1988. "Hey dad, now we're even on Olympic medals!" Strolz said on Austrian TV, before going one better with a team parallel gold.

He wasn't the only alpine skiing medalist with a strong family pedigree.

Ryan Cochran-Siegle of Team USA followed in his mother Barbara Ann Cochran's tracks by winning silver in the men's giant slalom, 50 years after she won gold in the slalom in Sapporo.

Coming from a family full of Olympians, "I grew up in a cool atmosphere where being at the Olympics was attainable," Cochran-Siegle said before his win.

Swiss skier Michelle Gisin, who defended her Olympic title in the women's alpine combined, also pointed to the family connection as a motivating factor to win. Her sister Dominique won Olympic gold in the downhill in 2014.

"My brother and my sister are my role models. I loved watching them. I always wanted to do the same things as them... They're my idols in every way," Michelle Gisin said in a recent AFP interview.

The sibling factor

At least 76 pairs of siblings took part in the Beijing Olympics, according to a tally by Sports Illustrated. In the past, siblings have had success in paired sports like figure skating and luge.

But it is notable how many competed individually at the 2022 Winter Games, although often in the same event.

While Ayumu Hirano of Japan won the men's snowboard halfpipe, his younger brother Kaishu set a world record by performing a trick while rising 7.5 meters above the edge of the pipe.  

In the women's event, compatriot Sena Tomita won bronze while her sister Ruki finished fifth.

Freeski halfpipe Olympic champion Nico Porteous of New Zealand said competing in an Olympic event with his older brother Miguel, who was 11th, was "pretty special." "I think that's anyone's dream...that's a lifetime memory that will never go away."

Team Japan especially seemed to benefit from the sibling factor: besides the Hiranos and Tomitas, it had the Takagis, Kobayashis and Watabes.

Speed skater Miho Takagi won one gold and two silver individual medals, then took silver in the women's team pursuit with sister Nana. Akito Watabe won bronze in the Nordic combined team event with brother Yoshito after winning individual bronze in the large hill/10km. Olympic ski jumping gold and silver medalist Ryoyu Kobayashi also competed alongside his brother Junshiro in the men's team event, but they had to settle for fifth place.

A shared experience

Elsewhere, Sweden's Oeberg sisters, Hanna and Elvira, won gold together in the biathlon women's 4x6km relay, while Slovenian brothers Peter and Cene Prevc bagged silver in the men's ski jumping team event.

Less fortunately, the Russian Olympic Committee's Maxim Burov, the reigning world champion and a favorite to win men's freestyle skiing aerials, failed to qualify for the final. But his older brother Ilia stepped up and won bronze, resulting in a neat distribution of medals in the family's trophy cabinet with all world championship medals so far on Maxim's side, and all Olympic medals going to Ilia.

Mixing it up a bit, Cassie Sharpe of Canada won silver in freeski halfpipe, while her brother competed in snowboard big air and slopestyle. And freeski big air silver medalist Tess Ledeux of France topped her cousin Kevin Rolland, who won bronze in 2014 in the men's freeski halfpipe and finished sixth this time.

Even with competitions and performances foremost on their minds, the presence of a family member in the rarefied world of Olympic Games is a unique source of support, as Ilia Burov noted after his brother did not make it to the final. 

"I saw him there supporting me, cheering for me, and it was with thoughts about my brother that I tried to show a good performance."

For Ayumu Hirano, as well, this was a precious moment to remember. "I have been dreaming of competing together with Kaishu, my younger brother ... For us to ride in the same event is something that we will take into our hearts for a long time to come."

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