How much is an Olympic gold medal worth?

It depends on how much media exposure you get before the Olympics start. If you were already hyped to the public and you deliver the goods, you will make a lot of money. If you were a surprise winner without prior fanfare, it will be more difficult to really cash in, unless you have a very animated personality.

if it meant making a ton of money, i think i could manufacture an animated personality

There is one true value in terms of commercial endorsements and the like applicable to all Olympic gold medals, from the men's 100m through the women's hammer throw and 20km walk. They all get the same amount of exposure, media adulation and financial windfall.

It just needs a proper study to find out what this value actually is. Maybe you could be the one to unlock this secret number!

Arthur74 wrote:

And in particular, does anyone know what the Chinese government will be paying its athletes if they win in Beijing?

They get to keep their head!

I remember Frank Shorter commenting on this right after he won in Munich. Frank said something like, "Looking at a gold medal as being worth X amount in your future is an excellent formula for ending up disappointed." Then he said he came home from the Olympics, went back to (I think) law school, and went back to training. In other words, he went back to what he was doing--picked up from where he left off when he traveled to the Games. He's done pretty well for himself, with most of it (based on what the general public can appreciate about him) based on his Olympic success.

Bruce Jenner did alright. He was good looking and he had a beautiful wife and he won a glamorous event. However, this thinking indicates that perhaps one gets into the Olympics and trains for all those years merely to cash in on your success. It does not account for the fact that an athlete does a sport, like Ryan Hall has said, simply "because I just love to run--that's why I do this."

Gymnast Kim Zemeskel (sp?), who had a terrible Olympics after being a media darling, said as much. "I never looked at the Olympics as a big negative experience. Yes, I performed poorly, but I don't regret any of it because I did it for the love of my sport. I don't remember any of it being a sacrifice. I spent some wonderful years and I have great memories of my times leading up to the Olympics. I loved my fellow competitors and my coaches and pretty much everything about gymnastics." And on the same hand as that, Shannon Miller stepped into the spotlight when Zemeskel faltered, but it didn't exactly become a cash cow for her like it did for Bruce Jenner or Summer Sanders or maybe some others (Eric Heiden? Bob Mathias?).

Mark Spitz is a pretty good example of someone who had a spectacular Olympics, was extremely popular, but then failed at nearly every attempt to strike it rich off of his success and popularity.

$3,000,000

The problem is that most track and field athletes are boring as hell (except for 100m sprinters). About the only distance guy with much personality was Gabe Jennings.

It would make an interesting book to follow up on successful athletes and their lives after their glory.

Hockey player Mike Eruzione (captain of 1980 Miracle on Ice team) turned down most of the opportunities offered to him and happily went back to anonymity in his home town.

Hurdling's 1972 Olympic gold medalist Rod Milburn spent much of his post-Olympic time being rejected from (mostly coaching) jobs and ended up in a homeless shelter. It was originally reported that he fell into a vat of acid at the foundry where he worked, but I think the official story was he collapsed and died from toxic fumes from acids while at work. Pretty much none of his co-workers knew he was ever in the Olympics.

Look at child actors--pretty much everything else you do in life will be considered downhill by others, which isn't always fair. Perhaps that is a factor many Olympic medalists must deal with. Carrie Fisher complained after she completed the first Star Wars movie, "Now there's nowhere to go but down."

Overcoming that early success is sometimes difficult. Jazz clarinetist Artie Shaw said success is one of the worst things that can happen to you. The musician who was once married to Ava Gardner and who's best songs were at the top of the Hit Parade said, "Failure you can deal with, but success screws up your whole life and everyone around you to the point where you can't get anything done and nothing is fun anymore." He quit the music business and had his clarinet made into a lamp.

William Tanui won 800m Olympic gold in 1992, but by the end of his career he was pacemaking for guys like El Guerrouj. Incidentally he is competing at the world masters championships in Italy next month.