Should we have % for Olympics because China has 1.3billion ppl!!!?

Question

I was just pondering that maybe people should pay attention to the amount of medals that a country gets divided (maths?) by the population. Say if US has 250m ppl and China 1.3billion then this should be taken into account in some way. I suppose we just do the math ourselves? At my kids school they have a outright winner and a percentage winner... I think it is fair. Any comments?

Answer 1

I don't think it would be fair. Why everyone is pointing finger to China?Just because they are leading the medal tally?

Imagine if you are dividing the number of medal won by India? India does not have 1.3billion people but their number of medals are limited. How about those country of a few millions? If they win maybe a few medals, I bet that their percentage is definitely higher. I'm sure if percentage is counted, USA would not be no. 1 as well. So if that happened, are you going to recommed other type of calculation? Why not, we just let USA wins the Olympic every 4 years?

Olympics is a fair event. Every athlete needs to pass the Olympic qualifier. Just because they are winning more medals this time, doesnt mean that it is unfair.  

Answer 2

How well a country does also depends how much the government supports and promotes sport and what facilities there are, not just the size of the population.

But on Australian TV they were comparing our population (about 20 million) with the number of medals we have won.

Answer 3

medal-counting is dumb anyways. it's interesting to know facts such as medal count but to make a big deal about it is silly

Answer 4

China 100% winner..that's all what i can tell you

Answer 5

I think the whole medal count idea defeats the purpose of the Olympics - This is not a competition between countries, it is a competition between individuals and teams from different countries.  Your idea is correct - per-capita the US is far better than China. And when a small island nation of 200,000 people wins a bronze medal in some obscure sport they will be better than the US. It really isn't that important.

Answer 6

no.. thats a silly idea sorry.

Answer 7

It's fair if having olympics was all about national glory. too bad olympics was meant to celebrate humanity. each and every champion shows us how we far we can go.

Answer 8

No?

There is no award to any country for having the most gold medals, overall medals, or whatever silly system anyone comes up with.  Any system is flawed by default, because if Michael Phelps can win 8 gold medals when an entire basketball team can only win 1, as good as Phelps is, it shows not all medals are created equal.

The winner of the Olympics are the individual athletes and teams competing in each individual event.  Outside of that, the fans win as long as they show sportsmanship and respect to the game.

Answer 9

lol I don't think that would work.... but to me it sounds tempting! My country (Norway) has 4.5 million people only.. hahah!

Answer 10

Another sore loser?

Geez, in this case US sent 650 athletes and still got owned (in gold medals) by 626 athletes by China. How do you explain that?

Losers are losers, there are no excuses.

Answer 11

not really i think there are a few small countries with multiple medals already, i know one country has less then 3 mil in it and they have 3 medals.