50 countries to beat 1.

This reminds me of the time a group of guys ganged up on one kid and beat him senseless, then afterwards all the guys were braggin that they personally kicked the guys ass. Even the stupid fuck who was pummeling on him when the guy already was knocked out.

So what..my school had an anthem but it didn't make it a country nor did it make that anthem a national anthem.

Australia owns swimming.

Must be from learning how to swim really fucking fast to avoid getting eaten by a shark. :thumbsup

i know,that's why i brought the racial comparison now :-)

Shhh we have to keep up the front. :1orglaugh

Uhhh, yeah, you mean like the united states is still around?


and European Union, I wouldn't expect the US to get more medals than a bunch of countries put together... Break it down to country by country :-D

50 medals

:2 cents:


BIG B

Yeah it reminds me of that video from Shane's world where like 3 american guys are going to gang up on that one Canadian guy.. and all you Americans found so funny. :1orglaugh

The EU having many countries is similar to the US having many states.

Seriously.. the US did pretty poorly in the Olympics for the last "Superpower".

They got the most medals of a single country.. but they sure as fuck didn't dominate by getting 1% more of the total medals then Russia. (which is half the size of the old Soviet Union)

Hell it's lucky they had Micheal Phelps (sp?) orr they wouldn't likely have even got the most golds!

Who the fuck cares. Congrats to all the athletes. It was an interesting Olympics to say the least.

If you are into stats and putting country against country find the stat for number of Olympians who performed for Countries other then the US yet went to school and trained IN the US. I think you will find an alarming large number.

ROFL!! Absolutly agree!!:1orglaugh

I could care less about that SW video, but if I remember correctly it was pretty evenly matched... well, three to two. Two canucks and three guys from the U.S. with one holding the camera. Don't be mad cause the canadians buddy didn't jump in to help... must be the French in him.

Not really, some states have a population lower than some cities.

So then next time in Bejing, does that mean we can compete as individual states? If that was allowed We'd have a two to one advantage over the EU.

It is the same in EU, some countries have lower population than in some cities.

That doesn't garauntee any success.

:thumbsup - See what I mean earlier though about it all being so arbitrary? You can slice the results in so many different ways.

In international law and international relations, a state is a political entity possessing sovereignty, i.e. not being subject to any higher political authority.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=state

when the latest US athletics drugs crisis shakes down it will be interesting to see how it rebuilds. I would hope it would come out stronger and cleaner.

The US had 28 medals in swimming, Australia 15. :1orglaugh

Well looking at each EU "state's" statistics individually, you have a point there.

But attempting to group them all together when they competed individually is not saying much. I guess some people feel proud that it takes some number shuffling to say they came out with more golds.

They competed individually so their medal count should be weighed individually, if they competed all as one nation, then I would recognize the accomplishment.

Population of US = 293 million people

Population of Australia = 20 million people


The US has over 14 times the population of Australia, yet only got 1.8 times the number of swimming medals

So you think they got the medals they did just because they competed individually?

On a per capita basis, China does incredibly poorly as well.

who cares about population? the olympics isn't about everyone in the country competing, it's about the best of that country who choose to compete. hell, there's probably some olympic sport i'd be great at but i don't but there are people who are fanatics about the sport and thats who you see out there.

fuck the whole population bullshit, base it on the ones that did compete, not how many people are in the country. again... its a way of trying to justify why some countries sucked ass just to make themselves feel better.

Now that is very impressive. :)

Yeah you'd think they'd do better.. but they are very HOMOGENOUS.. pretty much everyone in China is from an asian background.. and maybe that doesn't include the genes to be really good at the 100 yard dash and the like. They own at stuff like diving though.

Western nations have a much more diverse population these days generally..

I guess it depends on if you think the only factor in winning medals is desire + training.. or if you think genes play a part.

You think America, Russia or China would win the number of medals they do if they had the population of the Netherlands or Canada?

Answer = no

Let me see if I can explain this so you morons will understand it.

The EU isn't a country.

Now, that should be enough of an explanation here, but since it obviously isn't for some of you, I will expound on the point for you.

See, it's like this... the EU is a union made up of a bunch of countries and territories. Those countries and territories compete against each other in many events. When an athlete from one of those countries wins a medal, he/she wins it for their country first and foremost. Their country cheers and their people puff their chests up with pride over said medal being won.

Whereas....

The US is a country made up of states. The athletes from those states don't usually compete against each other, they are usually on the same team. In certain cases they do compete in the same race against each other, but all US athletes represent the US, not their individual states.

Is the difference becoming clear yet? Sarah said it best..... that if that's the case then the UK can claim all medals won by all of their countries and territories as being UK. Sorry to the "EU" but in my mind it doesn't work that way for you and not for other unions.



Btw, Canada won 12 medals in total, 2 more than their poorest showing of 10 in Seoul. We need to find ways to better fund and better motivate our athletes, definitely.

they competed individually so count them as individual scores, don't lump them all in one pile.

it's like saying I'm a multi-millionaire with numerous houses all over the world,... that is if you collectively grouped me up with all my close and distant relatives.

With your reasoning, a country with a population of 1 person should be able to win more medals than any other country

ANY country could have had as many athletes as the US did by qualifying to compete. The population has ZERO affect on who is a better athlete. Just because the US has 10 times more people, it doesn't mean that we in theory should have 10 times more of anything. The only people that care about population in the Olympics are the ones that lost.

If the US had a population of 1 million people, would it still win as many medals?

But this isn't the case, so it's irrelevant. Australia competed in the same # of races as the US did in swimming, so it was the better athletes who won, not the number of people they had in their country. Get it now? :1orglaugh

Obviously a country with a population of 293 million is going to have waaay more potential athletes than a country with a population of 293 people

Fact: Population is a factor that determines how many medals a country will win.

They could easily get more people to compete, but just goes to show you how many people actually wish to try out for these types of sports. Not everyone is into sports.

The olympics are not measure per capita, or per Union, and there is no U.S. of Europe you fucking twit. The olypic medals are measured per country and we owned your fat fucking mother.


I wish people who stirred shit were banned instead of surfers.

European Union was not recognized by the olympic comittee as a single entity. Didnt you notice all those separate flags for all those separate countries athletes?

End of story. *yawn*

Now, get back to work. All of you :)

Nobody really thinks that winning the most medals means squat anyway. They're "games".

no, not at all. i doubt any one person could excel in the variety of sports on the roster and win them all... get serious.

So if a country's population has NOTHING to do with the number of medals it wins, then why do countries with large populations win the most medals, and countries with small populations win the least?

Yeah, I guess population has NOTHING to do with it.

NOTHING AT ALL

EU claims it won Olympics:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2004401679,00.html

Yeah, if that competitor was that great.

He's saying that the ones competeing are the competitors, not all the people in the country they come from who could give a shit whether that competitor wins or loses.

India didn't win too many medals with the 2nd largest population either...

It's not all cut and dried..

If the US has 293 million people and another country has 1 person, and they run the same race, you're saying we should win because we have more people? The point of the Olympics is to show what YOUR country has. When you lose, it means you had athletes that were not as good as another country - PERIOD.

Last I checked USA finished first in overall medals including most golds

Exactly, and neither could a country of 2 people.

The larger your country's population, the greater chance you have of naturally producing champions. A country of 500 million has much greater chance of naturally producing champions than a country of 5 people

It isn't all cut and dried, but there is obviously statistical reasoning that people are denying

I think EVERYONE will agree it's a factor.. so is having the money to be able to spend all the time training and buying all the best equipment to give you an edge. Plus I think genetics plays a part as well..

I disagree. People obviously think population isn't a factor at all.