Top 10 countries with the most Olympic medals

[Vektor 3,195]

And for the Soviet Union and Russia: yes, it's unfair, but these medals should stay separated, because technically they are two completely different countries, and Russia simply didn't compete as an independent country for decades. Same goes for CZE and SVK, or the Yugoslav situation. You can't assign pre-1990 medals to countries that literally didn't exist back then. 

[Olympian1010 7,470]

2 hours ago, OlympicIRL said:

Medal tables are one of the most interesting parts of the Olympics for me. Yeah probably boring if you are from America because you win hundreds of medals and you practically know where in the table you are gonna finish each time. But for the rest of the smaller nations it really means something when an athlete wins a medal. It’s a great feeling of achievement and the medal table is another aspect of this. And another reason why tables should only be sorted by number of golds won and not total medals because that way smaller nations can climb a bit higher. Fiji with their 1 gold medal beats another medium nation who only wins 3 silvers and 3 bronze. I love that  

 

However, all-time medal tables are indeed boring  

I get that, but for me it’s the feeling of a country/athlete I’m cheering for just winning a medal the matters. It’s so special when a country like Fiji wins a medal, and the moment matters more to me than the ranking. Reporting on medal winning moments is one of the most rewarding and exhilarating parts of sports journalism in my opinion.

[Nickyc707 305]

15 hours ago, Federer91 said:

 

Yugoslavia is different, because the now nations inside it were much more even. While in the SU 80-90% of the medals were from athletes from modern Russia. 

 

The only right thing is to have historians break down the athletes from the now defunct nations and add the medals to the current ones. 

 

This is something that i have wanted to see for many years and as a statistics buff really annoys me..

 

You can't have an accurate all time medal table, when Russian athletes (medals) are counted in one, two, three, four teams, while China for example has all in one. The same goes for other nations. 

 

The table should be adjusted to maximum value each present country with it's historical merit.

At the time the Soviet Union was dissolved Russians accounted for 50% of the population. What evidence do you have to support your claim that 80-90% of the USSR's medals were won by Russians?

[Dragon 1,695]

41 minutes ago, Nickyc707 said:

At the time the Soviet Union was dissolved Russians accounted for 50% of the population. What evidence do you have to support your claim that 80-90% of the USSR's medals were won by Russians?

Luckily i have access to the stats. 64% of all Soviet gold medallists were Russian, next best is Ukraine with 15%

[Nickyc707 305]

4 hours ago, Dragon said:

Luckily i have access to the stats. 64% of all Soviet gold medallists were Russian, next best is Ukraine with 15%

Thanks for that, although it isn't a direct comparison as it only includes gold medals. Nevertheless, it sounds more realistic than the figures quoted previously.

[Olympian1010 7,470]

25 minutes ago, Nickyc707 said:

Thanks for that, although it isn't a direct comparison as it only includes gold medals. Nevertheless, it sounds more realistic than the figures quoted previously.

Oh believe me, I’m pretty sure he has all the statistics. 
 

@Dragon How do Olympic Historians handle this issue? Has their been any ground rules made? Or do most not care about topics like the all-time medal table?

[JoshMartini007 2,203]

I don't think there's a way to split medalists from former nations. Would an ethnic Russian living in Ukraine during the USSR compete for the former or latter? It comes down to the preference of the athlete so we can never know.

[hckošice 13,217]

If this may help here all Olympic medalists (they are counting all athletes born in territory of nowadays Slovakia or having Slovak origins)

https://sk.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slovensko_na_olympijských_hrách

 

Obviously, once again it is hard to count them separately, and personally I don´t think it is fair

 

From 1896 to 1912 athletes represented Hungary (part of the Austria-Hungary Empire)

and the best athlete of Hungarian team at the first Olympics was a swimmer born in nowadays Slovakia (Dúbrava) Zoltán Halmaj who won 2 G, 4 S and 1 B

Alexander Prokopp who won gold in Shooting in 1912 was born in Košice etc... The very first Olympian athlete of the modern era is Alojz Sokol (Alajos Szokoly) who won bronze in the 100m he had the BIB 1 in Athenes 1896 (Born in Hronec)

 

and from 1920 to 1992 atheletes represented Czechoslovakia

with Slovak born athletes winning 7-9-10 in Summer and 1-5-4 at Winter Games

 

but as I already said it is impossible to separate the Team sports medals, since the medal winning teams were composed of players from both countries For example the Football silver in Tokyo 1964 (9 Slovak players composed the team, almost the entire starting eleven) but in opposite for example the Volleyball silver team had only 2 slovaks in the roster

 

I think it should stay as it is, pre 1912 medals should be all counted for Hungary, the 1920-1992 should be counted for a now non-existing Czechoslovakia, and we should count only medals from 1994 for both Czech Republic and for Slovakia

[Monzanator 3,593]

2 minutes ago, JoshMartini007 said:

I don't think there's a way to split medalists from former nations. Would an ethnic Russian living in Ukraine during the USSR compete for the former or latter? It comes down to the preference of the athlete so we can never know.

 

Russian-speaking Ukrainians would compete for Russia most likely. If they couldn't make the Russian team though, they'd compete for Ukraine IMO. Just look at the Kazakh tennis team, outside of Zarina Diyas every woman representing Kazakhstan in the last decade or so is actually Russian (Shvedova, Voskoboeva, Pervak, Putintseva).

 

So it's not actually down to preference but the level of competition within the Russian team.

 

Someone like Natalya Goncharova was born in Ukraine and represented Ukraine until 2010 when she switched nationalities. Not to mention because Russia is much stronger than Ukraine in women's volleyball.

 

Here's one for @heywoodu Kim Staelens was born in Belgium to Dutch & Belgian parents and chose to compete for Netherlands who had a much better volleyball team than Belgium (still has even though Belgium has improved since).

[JoshMartini007 2,203]

11 minutes ago, Monzanator said:

 

Russian-speaking Ukrainians would compete for Russia most likely. If they couldn't make the Russian team though, they'd compete for Ukraine IMO. Just look at the Kazakh tennis team, outside of Zarina Diyas every woman representing Kazakhstan in the last decade or so is actually Russian (Shvedova, Voskoboeva, Pervak, Putintseva).

 

So it's not actually down to preference but the level of competition within the Russian team.

 

Someone like Natalya Goncharova was born in Ukraine and represented Ukraine until 2010 when she switched nationalities. Not to mention because Russia is much stronger than Ukraine in women's volleyball.

 

Here's one for @heywoodu Kim Staelens was born in Belgium to Dutch & Belgian parents and chose to compete for Netherlands who had a much better volleyball team than Belgium (still has even though Belgium has improved since).

 

That's still a preference, "I'd rather compete for Ukraine, because I have a better chance to move my career forward." Regardless, we won't be able to classify all athletes is my argument. Some people have strong ethnic ties, others have ties to where they were born while others would compete for whoever gives them the best option.