China's medals lopsided towards gold!?

Question

So many of the larger countries have a relatively balance of golds, silvers, and bronze. Not China, who won more golds than bronze and silver combined. Is this indicative of bias?

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/medals;_ylt=Ah_5FUABUyjpXzV7cv6H_8vQ1Zl4

Answer 1

i dont think so, they just had better athletes. 51 gold medals is something to be very proud of. i  figure that they will get atleast 60 gold in the next summer games. the U.S. for many years have dominated the olympics and now it is China's turn.  

Answer 2

not necessarily

Answer 3

no its cause China's government is insane and basically tortures their athletes by putting them in sport boot camps it kinda sad that they have to do that to be somewhat decent at sports

Answer 4

its indicative that china has a goal and they strive HARD to get there

Answer 5

China isnt the China 10, 20 ,30 years ago, they now are capable of anything.

Answer 6

China focuses on pure excellent achievement from their athletes and if they don't get it then the coach gets shot

Answer 7

it could be a bit bias but i dont think so...

i think its because Chinese athletes are expected to be perfect, so it's either win the gold or fail...to them silver and bronze are as good as nothing  

Answer 8

There are a lot of sports that China just doesn't care for, such as handball or field hockey.  Then they won't place anywhere close to medal contention in those.  But in the events that China could do well in, they can only win a certain number of medals.  For instance, they could only win two medals in diving and gymnastics.

Also, it's much easier to lose a silver or a bronze medal in an event they are good in rather than the gold medal.  For instance, in badminton, it's very difficult to upset both the #2 and #1 players to take the gold medal away from China than it is to lose to #2 and upset #3 to take the bronze medal away from China.  So in competitions that China traditionally competes very well in, such as shooting, weightlifting, badminton, table tennis, or diving, it's very likely with multiple competitors, China will win the gold medal, but lose the silver or bronze medal.

China had greater than 50% odds before the Games started according to oddsmakers, and that number only went up throughout the Games.  They were expected to win the most gold medals, so it's not surprising at all.

Answer 9

its because they enforced a system which started back in 2000 when they won the bid, they trained and scouted young athletes and assigned them to specific sports in where they could win multiple golds. this is the result of it.