Why has China's Gold Medal count increased so dramatically this 2008 Summer Olympics compared to years past?

Question

Background Info:

All-Time Overall Medal Count (Gold, Silver & Bronze)

United States (USA) 2404

Soviet Union (URS) 1204

Great Britain (GBR) 689

France (FRA) 679

Germany (GER) 648

Italy (ITA) 595

Sweden (SWE) 588

East Germany (GDR) 519

Hungary (HUN) 454

Finland (FIN) 446

Norway (NOR) 415

Australia (AUS) 392

Japan (JPN) 367

Canada (CAN) 361

China (CHN) 319

Russia (RUS) 319

.....the list goes on and you can view the full chart here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-time_Olympic_Games_medal_count

Of those over-all medals the USA's include 972 Gold and China's include 116 Gold. This 2008 Olympics USA has 26 Gold Medals to China's 43 (http://www.nbcolympics.com/medals/index.html).

Why do you suppose China's Gold Medal count increased so dramatically this 2008 Summer Olympics?

Answer 1

I'm not sure why, but does anyone else think it is ironic that they win a lot of their medals in sports that are subjective like gymnastics and diving?

Answer 2

China only joined in 1984, and for a nation with such short history in olympics, China could be the greatest nation to have improved dramatically over the years.  The programs put in place to popularise sports in China is commendable, and the results are shown through each olympics China participated in.

Instead of trying to bash down good performances, we should appreciate that they have made great strides in sports.  China deserves the accolates for doing well.

On the contrary, USA is starting to lose dominance in areas it excelled in, especially in track and field.  Other countries are just catching up, and USA has never felt more vulnerable.

**USA has more than 100 years of participation in the olympics, and China only 24 years!

Answer 3

The Peoples Republic of China only entered the Olympics in 1984 - Not 1896 like many other high ranking countries.

Answer 4

China hasn't competed at many Olympics compared to those other countries.

This is only Chinas 8th Olympics. It is USA's 25th

Since they started to compete their results have been consistently improving.

China has finished 4th, 4th, 3rd & 2nd at the last 4 Olympics. (Now they are 1st here)

Improving their medal count at each of the last 3 Olympics. (4 counting this Olympics)

Answer 5

steroids

Answer 6

Because they worked hard and deserved them

Answer 7

underaged gymnists and home cooked judging

Answer 8

Host country is one factor, remember when the USA hosted them we won around the same golds China has so far.

Oh and because their communist, they can pick anybody they want and breed them for just Olympic gold and throw them out later.

Answer 9

Because as the host nation China is allowed more athletes than any other country - some in each event and also the home crowd is a major factor

Answer 10

As soon as China were awarded these olympics in 2001 they started pouring a great deal of money into all the olympic sports. When you have a population the size of China you are going to find enough people with enough natural talent to be able to be trained enough to be very good medal chances in every event.. they have also worked extremely hard..

Answer 11

one reason I can figure out here..

because the games are hold in China, and that's easy for Chinese athletes to keep their best conditions. The same situation goes to Taiwan, Japan, Korea whose athletes are trained in east Asia. It is not easy to conquer jet lag if the games happen on the other side of the globe!

Answer 12

This is a perfect example of misleading statistics, deliberately hiding important facts while only show the information which support your theory. You should not use all time medals to compare this year medals count, as China did not join in Olympics until the 80s when USA compete since 1896..

If you read medal tallies for the past few Olympics, you will find that China did not dramatically earned more medals at all. It is host country advantage that China earned more than usual, which also happened to USA before.

2004 Olympics

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total  

1  United States (USA) 36 39 27 102

2  China (CHN) 32 17 14 63

2000 Olympics

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total  

1  United States (USA) 36 24 31 91

3 China (CHN) 28 16 15 59

1996 Olympics (hosted by USA)

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total  

1  United States (USA) 44 32 25 101  

4  China (CHN) 16 22 12 50

1992 Olympics

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total  

2  United States (USA) 37 34 37 108

3 China (CHN) 16 22 16 54

1988 Olympics

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total    

3  United States (USA) 36 31 27 94  

11  China (CHN) 5 11 12 28

1984 Olympics (Hosted by USA, now this is dramatic increase)

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total  

1  United States (USA) 83 61 30 174  

4  China (CHN) 15 8 9 32

1980 Olympics

USA and China did not join

1976 Olympics

Rank   Nation   Gold   Silver   Bronze   Total    

3  United States (USA) 34 35 25 94

China did not join

As you can see, China has a steady increase of medals earned over the years. It is not surprising on the total number and gold medals earned from China in 2008. On the other hand, USA does earned a lot less than usual. China does not take away USA share because China does not earned a lot more than pervious years, so the problem may be in USA herself.

Someone said China’s gold/non-gold ratio is not normal. I agree that the ratio is different from othwe countries, but 2008 is not the first year. If you read previous years stats, you can see 2000 and 2004 also have the unusal ratios. May be it is they spend more money on elite sportspersons than other countries all these years?

People also pointed out that China only do well in non-subjective sports. The  non-subjective sport most people referring to is gymnastic, however, China is always good in gymnastic, not all of a sudden doing well this year, unless people have to argue that China bribed the judges in every Olympics and every world championships. Another non-subjective sport China dominating is diving, noone challenge China about this one as it is too obvious that China’s divers are a lot better than the rest. The one subjective sport that China is doing very well but not her traditional sport is weightlifting, which got 8 golds. Noone seems to mention about this one neither. People are just concentrated on gymnastics, say it is non-subjective and generalised it as China only doing good in non-subjective sports.

Answer 13

Well

1. their population pretty easy to find the best atheletes

2. Government funding dramatically increases after be named olympics hosts

3. they have 7 years to prepare their best atheletes

4. america sucks now

so its a bit of China getting better and america becoming worse  

Answer 14

They have significantly more (200+ more) athletes than they have in past olympics because the host team automatically qualifies athletes in each event. They have more than 600 athletes this year and in Athens, they had 200 less. Plus, they wanted to perform really well for their home country.

Answer 15

China's olympic debut was in 1984 while other countries had competition histories dating as far back as the 1900s. The statistics you quoted in your question didn't take that into account.

Here's China's gold-count in the past games:

1984 15

1988 5

1992 16

1996 16

2000 28

2004 32

2008 43+

It basically shows a steady trend of improvement baring 1984, which saw China debut on the heels of a Soviet-led boycott, thus taking advantage of the diminished level of competition.

Answer 16

I believe China has amassed more medals in '08 because of the following reasons:

1.Aggressive recruitment and unrelenting training of raw talent. They groom Olympic athletes from adolescents.

2. Being on the favorable side of a lot of judging mistakes.

3. Home field advantage factor…at the very least, it doesn’t hurt.

4. Under-performing competition.

China’s questioned success in ’08:

1. China is destroying the competition in the gold medal department with an astounding 57% gold to silver & bronze ratio. That is just so impressive it is almost unheard of. Historically speaking, with regard to other elite countries, placing gold 40% of the time is impressive.

2. Coaches/Athletes have been questioning the scoring of the subjective events. I’ve heard quite a bit about wrestling, boxing and gymnastics. Chinese scores are seemingly higher, Chinese mistakes aren’t deducted fully, competitors scores are not receiving full marks and the split decisions seem to fall in favor of the home team. I’m sure the list goes on, depending on with whom you are speaking.

3. Speculation of age altering is also shrouding China regarding their Women’s Gymnastic team. The claim is that China has falsified the ages of some of its gymnasts to gain the advantage of younger, lighter and more flexible girls. Though these are accusations and nothing more, they still hurt China’s image.

Numbers prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics:

China (286 Medals) *Not including China Taipei or Hong Kong

Olympic Games: 7

Gold: 112 – Silver: 96 – Bronze: 78

Average 40.9 medals per venue 39% placing gold.

Japan (335 Medals)

Olympic Games: 19

Gold: 114 – Silver: 106 – Bronze: 115

Average 17.6 medals per venue 34% placing gold.

Russia (242 Medals)

Olympic Games: 3

Gold: 85 – Silver: 76 – Bronze: 82

Average 81 medals per venue 35% placing gold.

Soviet Union (1010 Medals)

Olympic Games: 19

Gold: 395 – Silver: 319 – Bronze: 296

Average 112.2 medals per venue 39% placing gold.

United States (2188 Medals)

Olympic Games: 24

Gold: 894 – Silver: 692 – Bronze: 602

Average 91.2 medals per venue 41% placing gold.

Compared to some other elite countries, China is really setting the new standard for medal achievement. I suppose we won’t know if these results are truly genuine until China has had a chance to establish itself over the next few Olympic venues.  Maybe they’ll win gold 60% of the time for the rest of eternity…who really knows.

The only thing that bugs me is the fact that China doesn't have an equal number of non-subjective gold medals.

Answer 17

This is stupid.  China has only been in the Olympics since the 1980s.  You can't look at the total medal count.

This is pathetically stupid.

Answer 18

Because the government needed to make sure they won the most, to make themselves look good, what every country does, so they put a lot of money into training of athletes.