Norway Braces for Games : Winter Olympics: Wood and rock are everywhere, serving as symbols for the event that begins Feb. 12.

You could say that the Norwegians have left no stone unturned in preparing for the 1994 Winter Olympics. Look under the rock that is Hovdetoppen Mountain in the town of Gjovik, and there is an ice hockey arena tunneled into the hillside.

You could say that the Norwegian wood is full of Olympic carpenters. Go to Hamar’s stunning “Viking Ship” speedskating arena, large enough to house five ice hockey rinks, and there are 30,000 trees worth of wooden girders, cut in world-record lengths as long as football fields.

Rock and wood symbolize these Games, now less than 100 days away. Rock and wood are “Norwegian things,” as Olympic chief of design Peter Moshus put it; two bountiful, fundamental materials in bucolic land of granite topped by forests of pine and spruce.

Rock and wood have been worked into every detail along the 72-mile stretch of Olympic territory in this valley alongside Lake Mjora--from the alpine venue of Kvitfjell, through the official Olympic host town of Lillehammer, down to the skating halls of Hamar.

Outdoor stadiums for cross-country skiing and biathlon are built of wood. Ramparts forming the ski jump bowl are made of rock. Athletes’ housing and the huge television center, to be converted to a regional college after the Games, are constructed of wood. Even Olympic medals will be crafted from the rock scooped from the ski jump area, with a design based on rock carvings dating back 4,000 years.

“Design is not famous in Norway,” Moshus said, in typically unassuming Norwegian style. Their Scandinavian neighbors like to poke fun at Norwegians as being hicks. But, when it comes to putting their natural resources to good use, the Norwegians throw all their historic vigor and practicality into the project.

The spectacular Mountain Hall, or Fjellhall, actually the secondary Olympic ice hockey arena where 16 of the 46 games will be played, is a result of Norwegian tunnel technology as much as necessity. Since there already was a small in-mountain swimming pool at the site, as part of a civil-defense shelter, engineers were curious to see what they could do with an Olympic showpiece.

“There are two small in-mountain hockey rinks in Finland,” project director Tore Bjorke said. “But this is the world’s largest; we got funding from the government to prove this is possible.

“We have experience in tunneling--50% of the in-mountain hydro-electric plants in the world are in Norway or were built by Norwegians. We can do this. Geologists have said that this venue is so safe that hockey players can play here without helmets.

“And, you know, when Saddam Hussein or somebody like that comes knocking with nuclear weapons, we can close the doors to keep him out. And have a hockey game, too.”

It took 29,000 truckloads to remove all the granite from Fjellhall, leaving a cave reminiscent of a theme park or a Batman movie.

Norwegians sarcastically call the arena’s in-mountain cafeteria the “hard rock cafe” and sell pieces of the rock--priced from 10 to 100 kroner (about $1.40 to $14)--at concession stands.

And they swear that the Pedersens, the family living in the large yellow house directly above the arena entrance, “never had a plate broken” during the 10 months of blasting that ended last January, though, yes, the glasses rattled occasionally.

Psychologists were consulted on lighting placement, so that spectators and participants wouldn’t feel claustrophobic, and the result is a bright little arena with 5,500 mauve-colored seats and silver aluminum slats on the ceiling.

The whole thing cost 134 million kroner (about $20 million), and Bjorke admitted that is “50% more than to build it outside, but after 12 to 15 years, it will break even because of the money you save on heating and operating costs.”

So, on Feb. 12, minutes after the Olympic Opening Ceremonies on the hill overlooking Lillehammer--when the Olympic flame will be delivered by a ski jumper flying off the ski jump--Norway’s national hockey team will play Russia in the Games’ first match inside Fjellhall, down there in the Pedersen’s basement of rock.

Meanwhile, the hottest ticket of the entire 16 days of the Olympics is for the Feb. 13 men’s 5,000-meter speedskating final--200,000 people on a waiting list for 12,000 seats--in the other engineering marvel, the “vikingskipet” or Viking Ship, created from Norway’s other basic material, wood.

In Norwegian, the word for “wood”--is the same as the word for “tree,” and for these Olympics the environmentally passionate Norwegians have reminded us of the closeness of one to the other.

Constructed on what Norwegians consider sacred ground--only a few hundred yards from where Viking ships from more than 1,000 years ago were found, thus inspiring a roof shaped like the hull of one of those “longships”--the “vikingskipet” arena is large enough to house Norway’s royal castle. Sideways. It is large enough that it will be used, after the Games, for indoor golf and indoor soccer, among other things.

Along with the figure skating Hall of the Northern Lights in Hamar; and Hakons Hall for ice hockey in Lillehammer; plus the environmentally cozy ski jump and bob/luge run--all of them rock and wood--Norwegian design suddenly appears on the verge of becoming famous.

By combining a natural sort of Thoreau Olympics--victory stands for medal ceremonies actually will be blocks of solid ice, cut from glaciers in the north and shipped to Lillehammer--with Norwegian folklore, these Games promise a unique charm.

For instance: A central legend in Norwegian history involves the infant Prince Hakon, during the civil war of the early 13th century, being rescued and taken safely on a snowy Christmas night to Lillehammer.

Little Hakon, after whom the Olympic mascot is named (along with Hakon’s aunt, Kristin, whose royal marriage later united the warring tribes), was saved by the cross-country skiing “Birkebeiners”--in English, the “birch legs.” More Norwegian wood.