Image via newsgd.com
Through Tuesday night in America the medal standings look something like this. Gold is in the second column, silver the next, bronze the fourth, and total medals in the final column:
USA 26 26 27 79
CHN 43 14 19 76
RUS 11 14 18 43
GBR 16 10 9 35
AUS 11 12 12 35
It is obvious that China has more gold medals than the United States, but doesn’t overall medal count have more significance?
If you assign a point value: gold having three, silver two, and bronze one, here is what the tally looks like:
CHN 335 points
USA 235 points
RUS 112 points
GBR 77 points
AUS 69 points
No matter how you look at it, China comes out on top. What do you think? Are gold medals really more valuable than the overall medal count? How does population come into play? Can you come up with something that would satisfy everybody?
I am Andrew Kneeland, and I blog for TwinsFix.com. You can reach me at andrewkneeland@yahoo.com.
5 Responses to “Olympic Medal Standings”
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August 20th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
I believe in the pts system. China is flat out killing us. I guess they have the homefield advantage. Gold is worth way more then Bronze
August 20th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Yeah it’s tough to see such a totalitarian country win, but I guess when the athletes have no freedom they have no choice but to train and train hard.
August 20th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
These games are tinted in my mind. The gymnasts for China are almost all underage (or at least look it) and some of the scores are flat out ridiculous.
*sniff*sniff* I smell B.S.
August 20th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Also, it must suck if the Chinese lose…they’ll never see their families again!
August 20th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
I also believe in the points system. Being so, I am forced to admit that America sucks.
Right?