Why does tiny Australia kick ass at the Olympics, while giant India flounders?

[drothgery]

I dunno, but isn't this sort of dismissing Japan, which is only restricted by its constitution from oversea force projection, and other states which limit themselves politically, rather than militarily? France has a number of forces stationed overseas around the globe, and has a ready supply of expendibles in their Legionaires. No French mothers picketing the French presidency over those boys...

Japan, like South Korea (and, to a much lesser extent, Germany) has a pretty good military with minimal ability to work out of area on its own.

France is something of a mystery. They should have a better armed force than they do; they've got fairly modern equipment, a decent-sized armed force, and they spend money on it. But they just don't do as well in action as they should; I suspect their weaknesses are in training, maintence, and logistics.

 

[LizardWizard]

You forgot about Russia!

You'd better ask: why does Russia, the largest country of the world with a population of 140+ million and great sports achievements in the past, lag behind?
Fortunately, our wrestlers, athletes and rhythmic gymnasts are rectifying this situation. We already have more total medals than the Chinese, and should enough gold to beat them in the two closing days of the Games.

 

[drothgery]

You'd better ask: why does Russia, the largest country of the world with a population of 140+ million and great sports achievements in the past, lag behind?
Fortunately, our wrestlers, athletes and rhythmic gymnasts are rectifying this situation. We already have more total medals than the Chinese, and should enough gold to beat them in the two closing days of the Games.

Russia does pretty well; it's roughly similar to Japan in population, and considerably poorer, but wins far more medals. They don't do as well as they did in the Soviet era, because the Russian government no longer throws money (and steroids) at the team, and because half of their team plays for other countries now (Lithuania took the heart of Soviet men's basketball; many of the best divers and gymnasts are from Ukraine or Belarus).

[edit: deleted Germany comparison; I always think Germany has more people than it really does.]

 

[Banshee16]

Just a thought: why does Australia, a tiny country of 18 million (or so) kick ass every summer games, while India, with over one BILLION people, scrape by with 1 or 2 medals?

I haven't checked the standings today, but ever since the games at Athens have started, Australia has been in the top five, easily competing with the USA and China, both Olympic powerhouses.

India has ONE medal thus far. I remember last Olympics they finished the entire games with a bronze medal in men's tennis.

Don't even mention MY country, Canada. We've got a population of 30 million (bigger than Australia, dammit!) and we do *nothing* at the summer games. We suck.

Now I know it isn't a simple population = medals correlation (obviously). But is it as simple as "Governments that spend more money on athletes do better at the games"???

Perhaps a better question is, why do I care?

Unfortunately, the Canadian government doesn't really believe in supporting our athletes. Artists looking to make sculptures out of dead pigs, yes.....athletes no..

On the interview with Mark Tewksbury, on Day 3 or 4, I remember him mentioning that official stance is that we Canada doesn't want to push participation, as that leads to drug scandals etc. So they emphasize "personal bests" and "Canadian bests"...I think it's a bit of a cop-out myself.

Australia's doing awesome for such a small country because they support their athletes....but Australia also has one of the most physically fit/active populations of any of the 1st world nations....far ahead of the U.S. and Canada.

I was glad to see Canada end up fourth with our women's epee team though. Not bad, given that we're not really considered to be "on the map" with regards to fencing..

Banshee

 

[Banshee16]

Uh, no offense, but you might actually want to visit the US before making a statement like that. Or India.

While India's economy is improving, and they will no doubt be one of the major countries of the 21st century, they're still in transition. The vast majority of people still work in the agriculture industry, and the literacy rate is not especially high (about 50% for women, 70% for men).

I realize that on Canadian TV, the US is often portrayed as backward, with poor people everywhere. But the largest problem facing the poor in the US is obesity. (And our literacy rate is 97%)

India's GDP per capita - around $3000
The US's - $37,000
Canada's - $29,000

I'm curious....are these figures in American dollars? I'm pretty sure Canadians tend to have a higher standard of living in the U.S., even though our dollar isn't worth as much.

I don't think the U.S. is backward....it's just that there's a far larger gap between the rich and the poor, so the poor are more visible than in Canada.

Banshee

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

You should be, it's wrong and inaccurate. I also don't think the fact none of them are members excludes them from the prohibition on personal attacks.

Wow, the lack of clarity is dizzying.

What was wrong? What was inaccurate? None of who are members of what? "Prohibition"? Practically a quadruple negative in that last sentence?

 

[Hypersmurf]

None of who are members of what? "Prohibition"?

The fact that none of the US Basketball team are members of EN World does not make them fair game for personal attacks; the general policy applies even though they're not reading this forum.

-Hyp.

 

[TDRandall]

I saw an article just last night at either CNN.com or foxnews.com that asked a question similar to this thread.

It's conclusion was essentially that the countries with the most winning required the athletes to always (or at least very frequently) perform, compete, sell, prove themselves and their abilities to sponsors.

Those countries that were not (this article posed) were generally those where the athletes were removed from "normal" lives and handed lives of entitlement (usually by the government) - at least while they were in the lime light and primes of their life.

I don't know if I agree with it 100%, but I figured I would toss that tidbit into the ring.

 

[drothgery]

I'm curious....are these figures in American dollars? I'm pretty sure Canadians tend to have a higher standard of living in the U.S., even though our dollar isn't worth as much.

I don't think the U.S. is backward....it's just that there's a far larger gap between the rich and the poor, so the poor are more visible than in Canada.

The figures are in US dollars; in most cases in this thread they're adjusted by purchasing power parity. Any response to the rest would tread very definitely into lands that the moderators decrees of 'no politics on ENWorld' forbid.

 

[Tim_Duncan]

You should be, it's wrong and inaccurate. I also don't think the fact none of them are members excludes them from the prohibition on personal attacks.

Ahem