It's hard to believe but Britain won only 1 gold in all sports back in 1996 + Advice to all gold medallists

Should be:

"Congratulations. You’re a world champion for life, and you’re an Olympic champion for life."

Or "Congratulations. You’re a world champion for one year, and you’re an Olympic champion for four years."You can't have it both ways.

o. O. . wrote:

Should be:

"Congratulations. You’re a world champion for life, and you’re an Olympic champion for life."

How state sponsored doping programs work:

- exhibit A: Spain, sucked big time prior to 1992 then exploded and now is leading in many major sports as cycling, soccer, tennis, basketball (close), ...

- exhibit B: China, didn't win much prior to 2008

- exhibit C: UK, sucked big time until a few years ago

Nutella1 wrote:

How state sponsored doping programs work:

- exhibit A: Spain, sucked big time prior to 1992 then exploded and now is leading in many major sports as cycling, soccer, tennis, basketball (close), ...

- exhibit B: China, didn't win much prior to 2008

- exhibit C: UK, sucked big time until a few years ago

Lottery funding is what happened in the UK.

Nutella1 wrote:

How state sponsored doping programs work:

- exhibit A: Spain, sucked big time prior to 1992 then exploded and now is leading in many major sports as cycling, soccer, tennis, basketball (close), ...

- exhibit B: China, didn't win much prior to 2008

- exhibit C: UK, sucked big time until a few years ago

China sent athletes to the games for the first time in 1984. They were 11th in total medals in 88. 4th in 92, 4th in 96, 3rd in 2000, 2nd in 2004.

So ummm ... yeah China has been great at the Olympics pretty much since they started participating.

& they woudn't have won that gold in '96 if the "oarsome fousome" combo of ginn & tompkins hadn't taken the easy gold in the 4s & instead had gone as a duo against redgrave/pinsent

this wouda been rowing race of the century

anyhows, ginn/tompkins dropped from 4s to pairs in '00, but ginn got a severe back injury which prevented them racing as a pair & tompkins got 3rd in pairs with a makeshift partner

ginn/tompkins were fully fit in '04 & won gold ( they finished pinsent as a pairs rower with their win over him/cracknell in '03 WC )...

Considering how work-centric American business has become compared to some European countries I wouldn't be surprised at all if in the coming years you see more athletes from countries like Spain figure into the mix while Americans struggle. A culture-mandated siesta would have done a lot for my running career.

ventolin^3 wrote:

& they woudn't have won that gold in '96 if the "oarsome fousome" combo of ginn & tompkins hadn't taken the easy gold in the 4s & instead had gone as a duo against redgrave/pinsent

By that logic, Redgrave and Pincent could have decided to race the four with the Searle brothers and beat the Aussies.

Either way, I think one gold apiece between GB and Australia in those events was the correct decision.