Who Takes the Cake in Total Medal Count

[Red Robot]

The cherrypicking thing is nonsense. So China puts together a national athletic program, and somehow that cheapens the accomplishments of Olympians who have worked their asses off? You can't criticize the Chinese for putting together the sports infrastructure Europe and North America have had for decades.

The United States, with their conflation of educational and athletic institutions, shouldn't be complaining about sports schools. China has just dropped the pretense of amateurism in athletic training. Nor should Americans gripe about how much Chinese athletes are paid. It's not like the old days when American and European amateurs had to compete with Soviet "amateurs". Now everyone's a professional. The United States' basketball team has six players making more than $20 million per year. Compensation to American athletes may not be as evenly distributed (e.g. I bet it's hard to be a professional fencer), nor does it come directly from government programs. But I think those differences are more a function of differences in social and economic institutions than an example of inequality.

Not to mention that nearly the whole Olympics is a competition in Western sports. A rare few are from elsewhere (judo), and some are arguably universal (swimming, running), but most have origins in Europe or North America. Western countries have traditions in these sports and decades of head start. I'm sure these medal counts would look much different if there were twelve events for different kinds of traditional Chinese martial arts or six kinds of traditional African wrestling.

The Olympics have never been fair. They're an exercise in inequality. It's silly to point a finger at China for simply trying to play the West's games.

[j127]

Yeah. one of my Korean friends was upset because the Chinese crowd at the Archery game between Korea and China would make noises at the point of Koreans' releases.

Don't worry. Have you seen the training methods of the Korean archers? From Korean media reports, they've stated that Korean archers had live snakes put down their shirts while they had to shoot at bull's eyes. They've had to train to shoot in the rain. They had to train in loud noise (music) environments and in stadiums filled with people hurling abuse at them.

And all the work paid off, as the Koreans did well in archery this year (they traditionally do well anyways).

If you really train hard enough, noise from jeering fans won't phase you at all.

[Ming Kong!]

Yeah. one of my Korean friends was upset because the Chinese crowd at the Archery game between Korea and China would make noises at the point of Koreans' releases.

Don't worry. Have you seen the training methods of the Korean archers? From Korean media reports, they've stated that Korean archers had live snakes put down their shirts while they had to shoot at bull's eyes. They've had to train to shoot in the rain. They had to train in loud noise (music) environments and in stadiums filled with people hurling abuse at them.

And all the work paid off, as the Koreans did well in archery this year (they traditionally do well anyways).

If you really train hard enough, noise from jeering fans won't phase you at all.

Reminds me of Ricky Bobby driving around with a cougar.

[Rasho Brezec]

I don't know where to post this, but I found this article interesting:


Medals per capita

[YiOF]

I want the USA to win but China has intentionally cherry picked the easiest events and targeted them for golds.

This makes no sense at all. What is easy? Is it easy if you dominate the competition? In that case, are Phelps 8 golds easy golds? Let us not be childish here.

Read this. This is what I am talking about. I don't know if you misinterpreted me, but China is going for where the gold is plentiful and therefore easier to come by. This is just the rowing example, but they've done it in many other events as well. The US certainly doesn't have 2000 rowers on our payroll.

China's dearest Olympic goal is to top the gold medals table.

At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, the country finished second only to the United States, with four fewer gold medals than America's 36.

To win the race for gold this summer, Beijing has been working to improve its chances in areas where the gold medals are plentiful — focusing especially on sports that have not been China's traditional strong suits.

China has never won a gold medal for rowing, for example, but they are hoping to change that this summer.

A Focus On The Obscure

To that end, China has launched the mysterious sounding "Project 119", named for the 119 gold medals it was targeting. These are in sports which have not been popular in China, like rowing, swimming and track and field.

This project was launched in 2001, and this year, ambitions are even bigger since the games are on home turf, and even more medals — 122 - are available in those events.

Under Project 119, China has spent millions of dollars on new facilities, bringing in foreign coaches and scouring the country in search of new talent.

One of the country's rising stars is Zhang Liang, a 22-year-old rower who towers at 6 feet 4 inches tall.

"I love rowing, and I train to win glory for myself," says Zhang, who took up the sport six years ago.

Today, Zhang is national single sculls champion, the event which involves a single person rowing.

With the hopes of his nation pinned on him, Zhang pursues a rigorous training schedule. He wakes up at 5 each morning to train, returns to his regimen after breakfast, and caps off his day with four hours of afternoon training.

He is one of approximately 2,000 professional full-time rowers on the government payroll.

'We Want To Compete And Fight'

National team coach Zhou Qinian explains that Beijing is focusing on rowing because 14 gold medals will be awarded in that sport this summer.

"Rowing is a major Olympic sport with many gold medals," says Zhou. "The more events and gold medals there are, the more we want to compete and fight."

Read the Article carefully, "To that end, China has launched the mysterious sounding "Project 119", named for the 119 gold medals it was targeting. These are in sports which have not been popular in China, like rowing, swimming and track and field."

M.... let me think which country wins the most medals in rowing, swimming and track and field. ah, that's right, The United States. By your logic, U.S is already getting all these "where the gold is plentiful and therefore easier to come by." medals. I guess China just didn't want the U.S to cherry picking all the "easy" medals.

[MagicMadness]

I don't understand how it could even be a controversial subject.

China decided to implement a program to drastically improve it's country's sports infrastructure. It would only make sense to begin by first targeting "where the gold medals are plentiful" - ones that China already wasn't winning in the past, and from there work on improving in other areas.

Basically, start off easy, and work your way up. I highly doubt China is only worried about this particular Olympics. They've got a major sports program in place for now and for the future - one that should only continue to improve over the ensuing years and decades.

[Al n' Perk No Layups!]

I don't understand how it could even be a controversial subject.

China decided to implement a program to drastically improve it's country's sports infrastructure. It would only make sense to begin by first targeting "where the gold medals are plentiful" - ones that China already wasn't winning in the past, and from there work on improving in other areas.

Basically, start off easy, and work your way up. I highly doubt China is only worried about this particular Olympics. They've got a major sports program in place for now and for the future - one that should only continue to improve over the ensuing years and decades.

I'm with you for the most part, though any country that wins a gold in "Race walking" should have an asterisk (Russia, I'm looking at you).

[doc.end]

I would vote for "I don't really care"