MILAN: Japan have set their sights on a new Winter Games medals record at the 2026 Milano-Cortina Olympics, hoping to top the 18 collected in ​Beijing four years ago, team chief Hidehito Ito said on Monday.

The Asian winter sports powerhouse which collected more medals than any other nation from the continent in China four years ago, will be looking to earn medals across a number of sports, including figure skating, snowboarding, speed skating and ski jumping among others.

“We have ‌received a ‌lot of very encouraging information, so ‌I ⁠feel ​there’s ‌plenty of reason for optimism,” Ito told a press conference, four days before the Games open in the northern Italian city.

“We believe that good results will follow when the athletes are able to perform at their very best. From our point of view, we would like to do everything ⁠we can to support the athletes so that they can win more ‌medals to surpass the best record ‍at the previous Beijing (Winter) Games.”

In ‍Beijing Japan won medals across seven different sports with ‍three gold medals. A total of 120 Japanese athletes have been registered for the 2026 Games with another 161 being coaches and staff.

The Japanese team will also be closely monitoring social ​media to block any online abuse of athletes. Some Japanese athletes had been the target of ⁠online abuse at the 2024 Paris Games.

“We are going to be tackling online abuse,” Ito said. “Experts will be tracking social media, and if we find something hurtful we will ask the platforms to delete the content.”

Ito said experts were in place both in Italy and back in Japan to act in case of abuse.

“We have six experts in Milan and one lawyer,” Ito said. “In Japan, we have 16 members of a monitoring team. We have set up ‌teams in both locations due to the time difference, so we can monitor online posts 24/7.” 

REUTERS