Jean-Claude Killy was co-president of the Organizing Committee of the 1992 Olympic Winter Games and was directly responsible for convincing the IOC to bring the Games to the Haute-Savoie. As an organizer, Killy was almost as successful as he had been as an Olympic skiier. The Games were awarded to Albertville but they were actually spread over several small towns and villages of the French Savoie in the French Alps. Problems with transportation between the villages were expected but they did not materialize and the Games were extremely well run. Because of the distance between events, there were several small Olympic Villages, instead of a single, central Village.

The biggest news at the Olympics was the introduction of several new teams because of the political upheavals that had occurred in the past two years. Germany competed as a single team and independent nation for the first time since 1936. Because of the break-up of the Soviet Union, the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, competed for the first time since 1936. Two newly independent nations that had been former states of Yugoslavia, Croatia and Slovenia, competed at the Olympics for the first time as independent nations. The Soviet Union, which no longer existed, was represented instead by a team called the Unified Team, representing a portion of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russia, Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), the Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan made up the states of the Unified Team. Something else that was new to the Winter Olympics in Albertville was the introduction of a number of new Olympic sports and events to the winter Games. Women competed in biathlon for the first time. Men and women competed in short-track speedskating, skated pack-style indoors. Freestyle skiing, which had been a demonstration sport in 1988, returned with the moguls being a full medal sport. Speed skiing and the other two freestyle disciplines, ballet and aeriels, were demonstration events. Sadly, speed skiing was marred when one competitor, [Nicolas Bochatay], was killed during a training run.
Athletically no single athlete dominated the Winter Olympics. The biggest medal winners were two male cross-country runners from Norway and two female cross-country runners from the Unified Team. Yelena Välbe and Lyubov Yegorova won five medals in the women's events while Vegard Ulvang and Bjørn Dæhlie won four medals in the men's events. It was the Olympic début for Dæhlie, who would dominate nordic skiing through the 1998 Winter Olympics. In alpine skiing, the only double gold medalist was Austria's Petra Kronberger, who won the slalom and the alpine combined.
The five men's speed skating events went to five different skaters, while in women's speed skating, America's Bonnie Blair won both sprints (500, 1,000), and Germany's Gunda Niemann won both distance events (3,000, 5,000).
In luge, 1988 silver medalist Georg Hackl won the men's singles, which would prove to be the first of three consecutive victories in that event for the German. In women's luge, Austria's Doris and Angelika Neuner won the gold and silver medals, making them only the second sisters to win the top two places in an individual event. The first were France's Marielle and Christine Goitschel in 1964 alpine skiing(/games/sportgames?editionid=37&sport_id=ASK), in both the slalom and giant slalom. Taken from http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/winter/1992/.

Barcelona had bid to host the Olympic Games in 1924, 1936, and 1940, without success. In 1986, when the IOC awarded the 1992 Olympic Games to Barcelona, it was considered by many to be in honor of IOC President [Juan Antonio Samaranch], as he was a native of Barcelona. But the Barcelona Olympics became the Games of the New World Order, and they were the most highly attended Olympics in history, both in terms of countries and athletes attending. After four consecutive Olympics with some form of protest or boycott, the Barcelona Olympics were boycott-free.

Since Seoul in 1988, the world had taken on a new face. The Soviet Union no longer existed but the Commonwealth of Independent States did. Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were once again free countries. East and West Germany were no more, replaced again by a unified Germany. Yugoslavia was now split into several republics, and only a few days before the Olympics began, the IOC granted Bosnia and Herzegovina provisional recognition to allow that new nation to compete. North and South Yemen had merged into one. All of these new national groupings appeared at Barcelona. South Africa had eliminated, at least constitutionally, apartheid, and competed at Olympia for the first time since 1960. The Commonwealth of Independent States competed as a "Unified Team" for the only time, representing all the former republics of the Soviet Union, save for the Baltic States. In the future, the separate former republics of the Soviet Union would compete as independent nations. The Games were opened beautifully and dramatically as archer Antônio Rebollo lit the Olympic flame via bow and arrow. The drama and beauty of Catalunya continued on stage throughout the 16 days of the Olympics. There was concern about terrorist activity because the area was home to some terrorist groups. The terrorist group Basque Liberty and Homeland (ETA) had killed more than 700 people during the past 20 years. Shortly before the Games, French police forces captured most of the ETA leaders, and it was discovered that plans were already in force to disrupt the Olympics. But the fears were unfounded and no major incidents occurred.
The competition was excellent. For the first time since 1972, all the major nations of the world attended. The most publicized athletes were the American basketball players. The U.S. was allowed to use professional players from the NBA (National Basketball Association), since all the other nations were by now using professionals. The NBA All-Star team, nicknamed "The Dream Team", did not disappoint, putting on a clinic for all nations and winning the gold medal unchallenged. They were led by professional greats Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, and Larry Bird, among others.
Many East European countries and the former Soviets continued to dominate certain sports, such as gymnastics and weightlifting. But with the changing economic picture in those countries, the future of their sports programs was in doubt. With the coming Games in Atlanta, the status of those programs was a matter of great conjecture.
There were many great athletic performances but, other than the Dream Team, it seemed no one athlete seemed to capture these Games like so many had in the past. It was probably fitting as then no athlete seemed larger than the Olympic Games themselves; fitting for Barcelona was possibly the finest manifestation yet seen of the Olympic Movement. Taken from http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/summer/1992/