Olympics 2018: 8 athletes you should be following on Twitter

If you aren’t following the Olympics on Twitter, start yourself off (and brighten your newsfeed) with these five athletes, from Adam Rippon to Chloe Kim.

In the generally less stressful days before Twitter became a part of daily life for a vast amount of people, the Olympics, like most other sports events, were mostly shared with people that you were watching with. Now, however, we’re in the age of live-tweeting pretty much anything and everything.

But say you’ve only just begun your journey into the strange realm of Olympics Twitter. Where do you turn? How can you possibly keep all these athletes straight? What if you’re — gasp — following unfunny people?

Fear not, timorous Twitter user, for we come bearing recommendations for you to start your journey.

Adam Rippon

Adam Rippon has already helped the U.S. to a bronze medal in the team figure skating event, and while his graceful skating on the ice has certainly won him plenty of fans, his Twitter feed is one of the funniest out there. Unafraid to speak his mind (and more than willing to knock others’ eyebrows or dub himself a “glamazon“), Rippon will make you laugh and also give you some encouragement.

Maia and Alex Shibutani (The Shib Sibs)

If following three Twitter accounts for two athletes seems like too much, then just follow Maia and Alex Shibutani’s joint account. It’ll retweet the highlights from both Shib Sibs’ personal Twitter feeds. While Alex has an ongoing wish for a black figure skate emoji, Maia does focus a bit more on … you know, actually using emojis. Still, the two have been more than happy to post all kinds of behind-the-scene photos from the Olympics.

Chloe Kim

Chloe Kim is 17 and already has a gold medal for her efforts in the women’s halfpipe of snowboarding. But, before you think that she’s far, far beyond your mere mortal skills, she also tweets a lot about food.

Maybe don’t follow her if you’re someone who gets hungry at the mention of food, but talk about being able to relate, right?

Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir

For more pretty pictures of figure skaters, there’s nobody better than the Canadian ice dance team of Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, winners of the highly coveted Man Crush Monday award this week at Culturess.  Whether or not you want them to have a relationship or just feel like they deserve to be happy, it’s nice to follow them (oh, and both of them also tweeted about things like Bell Let’s Talk, so they’re aware of issues like mental health).

Mirai Nagasu

Okay, yes, Mirai Nagasu is yet another figure skater, but she’s tweeted about drag queens, whether or not she’d go on Dancing with the Stars, videos of her landing jumps like the triple axel and also about her friendship with Adam Rippon, who’s also on this list. Need we say more?

Pita Taufatofua

Pita Taufatofua is pretty much the greatest. Try switching sports solely so you can walk shirtless and oiled up at two Olympics opening ceremonies in a row. He’s a cross-country skier now for Tonga, after competing in taekwondo in Rio de Janeiro’s 2016 games. Also, he picked that sport because of its difficulty.

Or just follow him on Twitter and look at the pictures, since he doesn’t tweet much … but when he does, it’s usually with a photo attached.

Just saying.

Next: 3 things winter Olympics fans will love

With that, you now have the basics of the winter Olympics on Twitter!