A better way to count: medals per capita

The emphasis on total medal count at the Olympics misleading. Shouldn’t we compare country performance on a per-captia basis? As of today the leading medal countries of China, the US and Great Britain have total medals of 64, 63 and 40 respectfullu. If you calculate medals per 10 million population this converts to China (0.5), US (2.1) and Great Britain (6.6). Canada stands proudly at 3.1 medals per 10 million population. Call it chicken soup for the Olympic soul By the way, Jamaica is at 14.7.

In the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Canada finished 8th per capita behind the Scandinavian countries, Austria, Swizerland, Latvia and Estonia. The winner by a mile was Norway at 50.3 medals per 10 million population.

If you want to amaze your friends and family with such Olympic trivia, I will have the total results for both winter and summer combined at the end of the Olympics.