|
|
Which country produces the best quality athletes?
Sure, the US may have won the most medals in Athens 2004 and again in Beijing
2008, but it is the third most populous country in the world. The table
takes each country's medals, award a point value of 3 for gold, 2 for silver
and one for bronze, and then divide by that country's population in
millions. In 1996, the winner was
Tonga, which won a silver medal while only being able to draw on a population
of 100,000! When I posted these
tables daily on my Reuters page back then, newspapers from Hong Kong, Denmark
and India ran articles on this more balanced way to see how the countries
perform. Population figures are from
the Yearbooks of Encyclopćdia
Britannica. Olympic medal totals are
from Yahoo! In Sydney, sports-mad home-team Australia led the table
every day up until Thursday 9/28, when the Bahamas, a small country winning a
silver medal sprinted (literally and figuratively) into first place. Could Australia win enough additional
medals to reclaim the lead? Not after the Bahamas added a gold medal in the Women's 4x100m
relay! In Athens, the same
pattern repeated, with Australia building up an early lead thanks to the
swimming events, but then a new “golden girl” track star from the Bahamas
provided that tiny country with an insurmountable lead that was further
solidified by another bronze. Cuba,
winning some boxing gold on the final day, came close to but just short of
Australia’s mark, so the population adjusted weighted medal totals order for
the top three was unchanged from 2000.
In 2008, Caribbean sprinters would have enabled their countries to
claim the top three ranks, with Jamaica sandwiched between tiny Netherlands
Antilles and the Bahamas, but the silver medalist from the Netherlands
Antilles was disqualified for running out of his lane, so Iceland gets the
bronze for its silver medal in handball.
At the foot of the table, you can find the total of all the medals
awarded and compared that to the world's population, to show what the score
what an "average" country would have. Thus, of the 87 countries (up from 75 in
Athens) whose athletes have earned medals, 59 of them did better than the
world average. Congratulations to all
participating countries and athletes, but particular congratulations to:
GOLD Jamaica SILVER Bahamas BRONZE Iceland
|
|