Olympic cycling medals musings.

[snorri]

Unfortunately our swimmers were focused too much on partying, and Michelle Jenneke was focused too much on jiggling, to the detriment of their competition results.

Yeah, I heard they were racing on bikes around the competitors enclosure at all hours of the day and night after they discovered the freedom and joy of cycling helmetless.

Sorry, IGMC

 

[swee'pea99]

After what games did they decide to do all of this??

I would have said it was after Britain's pitiful performance at Atlanta 1996 (only 1 gold, to much wailing and knashing of teeth from the media) with the drive for more medals starting go bear fruit 4 years later at Sydney, but others have said it was Athens where it all started to happen.

"The journey began in the wake of humiliation in Atlanta in 1996 when Britain finished in 36th place in the medal table, below the likes of Algeria and Kazakhstan, and prompted then prime minister John Major to divert Lottery funds to elite sport.

A second key turning point came in 2005, when the then UK Sport performance director Peter Keen and the redoubtable then chair Baroness Sue Campbell went to see the chancellor, Gordon Brown, in the wake of London winning the right to host the Olympics. They showed him a piece of paper that outlined how many medals Team GB could win in London and how much it would cost to underpin the journey to get there. Brown agreed to a huge increase in funding and seven years later, Team GB delivered exactly the number of medals in the presentation clutched by Keen and Campbell: 65."

For the full story... https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/aug/05/britain-team-gb-medals-rio-olympics

 

[YahudaMoon]

Manchester's was in fourth place a few days back

 

[winjim]

The Olympic Medals Per Capita table is quite interesting....

Ah. I had been wondering if there was a medal table by GDP. There is, and GB&NI are 36th.