Posted on 08/11/2024 8:38:26 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
The U.S., which became the first country to top 3,000 Olympic medals during the 2024 Summer Games, earned more medals in Paris than it did in Tokyo.
Athletes from the U.S. took home 126 total medals this year, topping China (91), Britain (65) and France (64).
China had been ahead in the race for gold throughout much of the games, but China and the U.S. both earned 40 apiece by the end of the games. In addition to 40 gold medals, the U.S. won 42 silver and 44 bronze medals.
While the U.S. won the most medals, it isn't home to this year's winningest athlete. China's Zhang Yufei won six medals: five bronze and one silver. France's Leon Marchand took home five wins for swimming: four gold and a bronze.
It's the most ever wins by the Americans in a non-boycotted Olympic Games outside the U.S., topping the previous high of 121 from Rio in 2016, according to the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC). The U.S. has twice surpassed their Paris winnings, both times at home. Team USA won 174 medals in Los Angeles in 1984 and won a whopping 239 medals in St. Louis in 1904.
The U.S. took home 39 gold, 41 silver and 33 bronze medals for a total of 113 during the Tokyo Games. Team USA took home 121 Olympic medals in Rio in 2016.
According to USOPC, the U.S. has topped the medal chart since 1996. The U.S. took home 101 medals that year.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
I took a badminton course in college. I thought it would be easy credit. The teacher was a semi-pro player. I didn’t even know there was such a thing. It was a class full of manly men-we were all hard-core jocks, and we all laughed when he took out his racquet from a hard case. He proceeded to fully humiliate each one of us in short order. I had a newfound respect for him and the sport. Never made fun of it from that point on (over 40 years ago).
Nobody really cares about the medal count because of the apples to oranges aspect. I believe you’ll find Australia is near the top in terms of medals per capita. Botswana, a fairly small country in terms of population, about comparable to montana, did quite well and almost won a relay as well as winning one of the sprints. It’s not a poor country, they have gold and uranium.
Results ebb and flow but there’s also a lot of continuity of results in general terms.
Canada had a good Olympics compared to some, but about half the events at the Olympics mean very little to anyone but the friends and families of the hundred odd people who actually do the activity in question. Other events are just plain bizarre, bikes racing around in odd configurations on a track that is far too small, lifting absurd amounts of metal for no obvious gain, throwing a javelin — who in their everyday life would ever need to throw a javelin?
I don’t see why the Olympics has to go back to places it has been before, why not have it in Africa for a change? Or India? Use it as a bargaining tool, Iran could host the Olympics if they stopped supporting terrorist groups.
Not one second of it.
Not one second of it.
____________________
Me as well.
I will never forgive them for having a man exposing his testicles behind a little girl.
NEVER.
I mostly stopped watching Olympics when the athletes who were supposed to be amateurs became professionals who are sponsored 24/7/365 by someone.
Only Olympics worth tuning in for are the winter games.
Likewise.
Watch them complain the medals are not DEI enough ,LOL
Well, I have a ~450 ft. stretch of property bordered by a fence line grown up in irregular “brush” and trees along an “outside curve” of the road: I have to regularly clear the ditch of small to modest size branches (usually not over ~ 2” diameter, but that’s “usually). Most branches get a “javelin throw” over the brush / fence and into the yard where I can safely deal with them. (Speed limit 55 mph on said road, plenty of faster traffic.)
Ok, maybe that’s not “typical”, but you did ask “who”. :-)
Plus, kids in more or less rural settings do a lot of stick chucking in a somewhat “javelin” manner. Spear chucking is probably in human DNA by now?
Granted, we could modernize, of course. Live grenade throwing as an Olympic sport would be a fun competition. ;-)
Anyway, when you get right down to it, few sports have a good “connection” to everyday life for most people. That’s kind of the point though, no?
Granted it may not be typical, but in the US a lot of gun owners do at least SOME practice shooting (as they should if they own firearms.) Surely those numbers exceed the number of badminton or table tennis players. All are legit sports, IMO.
BTW, ever tried playing badminton on a sandy beach? Whew!
Same here. I played tennis in HS and a lot if backyard badminton. Considered myself pretty good. Played in an intramural tourney in college. Won my first game. Second game I got matched up against a Pakistani guy who played at a totally different level. It was a short match.
I think I heard them say during the China/Taiwan gold medal doubles match that the shuttlecock can move at 300+ mph. I’m guessing it did off the Pakistani kid’s racquet.
Yes I have, only because I wanted to meet young ladies on the beach playing badminton.
Stanford athletes alone won 39 medals, which if it were a country, would have tied for 11th place in the medal count.
Germany came in 9th overall, with 33 medals.
Poor Caleb, Women weaken legs.
US Men’s Wrestling failed to earn a gold medal for the first time in over 50 years. Very disappointing showing from them. That fact is made even worse since Russia didn’t even participate. They usually clean our clocks.
The women did well though.
Not exactly the same, but it reminded me that I was stationed in England for one of the winter games, maybe 1974. The British TV would show a Brit ski-jumper and then add, "He's currently in 73rd place". OK!
Actually, that is the time I like to watch the Olympics is to see the “odd” sports. I like the unusual ones in the winter Olympics also like Curling.
I loved it when Eddie the Eagle was competing.
Hmmm. I looked him up as a reminder and it says he was the first person to represent Great Britain as a ski jumper and that was in 1988, so it must’ve been another event that I was thinking of from back in the day of 1974.
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