How many medals would we have if...

The one that caught my attention was Felix Sanchez who won the 400 hurdles.  Born in NYC, raised in So Cal, then runs for the Dominican Republic in the Olympics???

Then there was Kirani James from Grenada who went to school at Alabama and still lives there.  Hard to blame him since he grew up in a neighborhood in Grenada named "Gun Battle".

Mark

I snarked at Felix Sanchez too.  But I guess it's easier to qualify. You are THE GUY for your country as opposed to 1 of 300 or so.  And you make your grandma proud.  I'm all for athletes picking what country they represent. 

If you used the "you're from the country you trained-in", then Crissy Wellington would've been racing her first IM for Thailand, Lance would've run 6 TdFs for France, Bruce Jenner would've won the Decathlon for Switzerland.

Not quite the same...Lance was trained by a US coach...he just trained ON the course for the TdF....my point was the guys like Felix Sanchez...and other ones that come out here for college...trained by US coaches...then go home and run for their country.

To me, that's a US medal.

I think Johannes Bruyneel is Belgian (Lance's coach) but not trying to argue.  My comment was just trying to find the other side of the coin, but it's odd.  People born here, or move here when they're young and they spend every day out of 4 years here and then run in a jersey with Great Britain (Yep, looking at you Mo Farrah) on the front.

That sort of example is basically what I am alluding to...it seems VERY common in track...and there were a few examples in swimming too.

He is of Somalian Descent and moved to London when he was eight.  He was educated in England lived here until March 2011 when he relocated to Portland at Nike's behest who wanted him to be a flagship face of the brand and to train under his Cuban coach.  So no, you can't have that one.

Athletes train all over the world and it costs them a lot of money.  They are dedicated enough to pay for the best facilities and those facilities are profit driven enough to take the money from whoever pays for them.

So I think the only way you can resolve the issue is to build facilities that are for the exclusive use of US citizens.

I'd be interested to see how the medal table would look if the world's two most populous countries, and effectively continents in their size, operated in a way more typical with the rest of the world.  China operating as its 12 regions and America as its 50 states.   At the moment its skewed oddly because of the continental configuration.

Gold per capita has GB in a league of its own.

You can track this - and sort the G/S/B count by population, GDP etc.

I don't think this data really says anything important though. At the writing of this article, Grenada had one gold medal, and because of the very small population of the island (110k) they blew away all countries on the count/population and count/GDP.

okay, being a canadian with a cousin who was a track athlete, I have a good perspective on this.  My cousin's main goals in highschool:

1) make the junior nationals for the 110 m hurdles (he qualified in his grade 11 year, but it was on the same day as my sister's wedding and he chose family over than nationals).

2) get scouted for an american school to get a full athletic scholarship (he ended up quitting track in grade 12 to focus on his studies - I *think* this is likely because he knew he wasn't good enough to be scouted, he was second or third in his age group in Canada's most populus province, but the number 1 guy was from the same city and he couldn't beat him.

My cousin was a lucky kid who came from a good family and his parents made enough to pay for his university anyway. 

In Canada we don't have full athletic scholarships, or really any athletic scholarships at all.  Most scholarships are a combination of merit and academic acheivement.  (So a good athlete with exceptional marks might get a scholarship).  A lot of athletes in Canada (and I'm sure in places like Trinidad and Grenada as others have mentioned) go to the US to train while in university to get the oportunity to go to a good university under full scholarship that they wouldn't have if they stayed in their own country.  School is a lot cheaper in Canada than in the US, but if you have to pay for it yourself, you are looking at around $60,000 debt to pay off when you are done.

There are a lot of examples in swimming. One such is Michael (aka Milorad) Cavic... was born in Anaheim Ca, went to Tustin HS, but has competed in the last 2 Olympic Games for Serbia. Kirsty Coventry (Zimbabwe) trained at Auburn (may still train there). Dominic Meichtry (Sweden) trains with Cal (no longer a student there though).

In researching this response, I landed on this article about colleges recruiting and training foreign athletes.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303830204577448620436755502.html