The Gist: The Winter Olympics aren’t over until Sunday, but the story of Shaun White caught the attention of the most viewers of the Pyeongchang Winter Games.


There has been a slew of newsworthy events at the Winter Games this year, from Adam Rippon’s on-air personality, to triple axels, to the North Korean cheer squad, to doping allegations in…curling, and many more. So for the fun of it, we asked what people thought was the biggest story from the Olympics. 

Weighted by U.S. Census figures, the winner, with 26% of respondents, is Shaun White’s comeback.  

Let’s break down who exactly answered what.

Shaun White

Women, people age 18-34 are more likely to be tuned in to all things Shaun White. This is also a higher income group, as people who make between $50k and $100k per year are more likely to answer White’s comeback, and they’re also more likely be homeowners. The coolest insight we culled, though? AT&T wireless subscribers are more likely pick the Shaun White option.  Should they partner with the Olympian?

What about the North Korean Cheer Squad?

It’s the teens cheering this story on. Under 18 year-olds are more likely to choose this answer. This kind of proves our hypothesis that social media is helping boost Olympic viewership this year and this story was widely shared on social. 25% of people think other delegations should bring their own squad:

Russian Doping

Men over the age of 18 are more likely to be clued into this one, thinking of it as the biggest story. Curling gets a half-joking half obsessive spotlight every winter Olympics, but this year seemed bigger. You even saw Mr. T tweeting about it. And the doping scandal seemed to be surprising, and maybe interesting, to many. 

We see more than 20% of people say the sport is exciting, even:

LGBTQ Representation

City-dwellers, under 18-year-olds, and those still living with their parents were more likely to select LGBTQ representation. This falls into the same virality as the North Korean cheer squad story. And it’s no surprise that the younger generation would have this more in their face than the older ones. On the topic of Adam Rippon, the first openly-gay US Olympian while competing, had quite a following, over 1 third of people thought his flawless performance deserved more than the third place medal:

We’re wondering what else you thought was big from the Olympics this year. Comment below, and stay tuned for an Olympic viewership post next week.