1. 2014 winter Olympics mascots.

2. The 2014 Winter Olympics, officially the 22nd Winter Olympics, will be celebrated from 7 to 23 February 2014, in Sochi, Russia.

3. Sochi was selected as the host city on 4 July 2007 during the 119th IOC (International Olympic Committee) Session in Guatemala City, defeating Salzburg of Austria and Pyeongchang of South Korea.

4. The Sochi Olympics are the first Winter Olympics (and first Olympics altogether) for the Russian Federation, as the 1980 Summer in Moscow were in the Soviet Union.

5. On the 2nd of March people in Sochi chose skiing dalphin as the mascot of the Olympics 2014. The voting was held together with the elections of the President of Russia. Over 270 thousand people gave their votes. But it was than officially announced that mascot will be elected not earlier than in 2011.

7. On 26 February 2011, at 11.20 pm the final results of the public vote during the live television show «Talismaniya Sochi 2014 – The Final» were announced on the first Channal. The election council made the decision that the top-three characters with the maximum number of votes would all become the Olympic Winter Games mascots:

8. The Polar Bear(Oleg Serdechniy, Sochi)

9. The European Hare(by SilviyaPetrova, Chuvashia)

10. The Amur Leopard(by Vadim Pak, Nakhodka)

11. Commenting on the results of the live vote, Dmitry Chernyshenko, President of the Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee,said:

12. Today, The Sochi 2014 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games have adopted its own symbols and, for the first time in the history of the Olympic Movement, the whole country was involved in choosing the mascots.

13. There are three mascots for the Olympic Winter Games, representing the three places on the Olimpic podium.

14. All top-three characters according to the Olympic system will become the Olympic Winter Games mascots. The mascots are the choice of the whole our country and will remain in the history of the Olympic movement.