China's Gold Medal Lead Grows, U.S. Continues to Lead Total Medal Count

Photo: Gold medalist Stephanie Brown Trafton of the United States, silver medalist Yarelys Barrios of Cuba and bronze medalist Olena Antonova of Ukraine stand on the podium during the medal ceremony for the women's discus at the National Stadium on Day 10 of the 2008 Olympic Games.

With the 10th day of the Summer Olympics in the books, China's lead in the gold medal standings has grown, with 39 golds for the host nation compared to 22 for the United States. The U.S. still leads the overall medal standings, with 24 silvers and 26 bronzes for a total of 72, five more than the Chinese, who have 14 silvers and 14 bronzes.

Although it was hardly even noticed in the United States, the biggest story in the host country today was that China defeated Germany in the men's table tennis team competition. Table tennis is China's national sport, and if the Chinese finish the Games with anything other than four table tennis golds, they'll come away disappointed. So far they've won the men's and women's team titles, with women's singles starting today and men's singles starting tomorrow.

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

8-18-2008 @ 3:13PM

LA MAQUINA!!!!!! said...

were are the gold medals for samsung gold medal mania

8-19-2008 @ 11:21AM

Joe said...

Is this English?

8-19-2008 @ 1:04AM

P.J. said...

Just wondering if all of China's gold medal have been aqquired like the ones I have seen them get (Unfairly) it seem if you fall miss your mark or even have the worse routine in gymnastics and are from China you get the gold before the ones that do an almost perfect routine.I am very diappointed with the medal awards

8-31-2008 @ 12:55PM

Alyssa said...

yeah definitely china is winning all the judged events. hmm wonder why??
if you have been keeping up with gymnastics, especially the women, china is getting scored wayyy too highly and everyone else is getting deducted for nothing. nastia liukin got robbed on the uneven bars. it should never have been tied in the first place. and the tie breaker was the most idiotic tie breaker ive ever heard of.
i dont care where the judges are from this is CLEARLY biased against america. the head judge had to go down to all the judges and tell them to judge fairly and it clearly didnt work.
anyone else notice the chinese look like 12 year olds?
AMERICA got ROBBED.
oh and if youve been watching diving, who is dominating? chinese. duh. also a JUDGED sport

and china also wins all the gay sports like ping pong and badminton. they can have those golds. who cares?!

8-19-2008 @ 1:16AM

FlagranteDelicto said...

Do you know why Mexico never takes the gold at the Olympics?

Because anyone who can run, jump or swim is already in the United States.

8-19-2008 @ 11:37AM

rick said...

did the chinas goverment pay off judges because we got rip off in gymnastics

8-19-2008 @ 12:25PM

Prazzen said...

P.J., FYI the vast majority of China's gold medals are in non-judged sports-- i.e., straight-out competitions. And as far as gymnastics, in that one event you're referring to, the Chinese got a *bronze* after she fell, not a gold. In almost all the gymnastics events in which the Chinese have gotten gold medals, they've won by a large margin-- in the team gold, Alicia Sacramone fell place and all 3 Americans stepped out of bounds!

Besides, if the judging were so biased, why have US gymnasts won two golds in gymnastics?

China has won this fair and square. They're crushing the USA-- 43 golds to 26 gold medals, especially considering US advantages (our big sports infrastructure and our competitiveness in so many different events), they're utterly dominating the USA and the rest of the world. Just deal with it and try to do better next time. No sense in whining over it and being a crybaby.

8-19-2008 @ 2:40PM

michael1960 said...

to me its not how many gold metal china has over us, and it may or may not because of cheating. to me its the amount of metals for 2nd or 3rd place that bugs me. although we should have more golds then we should. I am surprised at what we dont have gold in. and what other countries don't have gold.one thing is for sure, we are ahead in metals right now. and I dont know if we will stay that way, what I am sad about is the fact, anyone can say true you americans have the lead in metals. I see you have a commanding lead in 3rd place, coming right down to it, we are really only coming in 3rd, we have the most bronze metals out of any one. so I don't want to know that we are 3rd best in the world, because only the best have more gold or silver. although silver and bronze are metals, being 3rd and having the most metals. is not as good and being 3rd, and having the most gold metals, I dont think we are only as good as 3rd place, we should not be happy with our first place in the overall metals, if our most metals are only 3rd best.

8-20-2008 @ 11:08AM

shisendu said...

I believe the US will lost the Olympics this year. I still do not know why the NBC and Yahoo rank the medals by total medals not the gold medals. Maybe the US is the only country rank the medals this way........... In this way, it seems 100 bronzes medals are better than 99 gold medals.......
It is so funny.............................

8-20-2008 @ 11:43AM

8-20-2008 @ 8:12PM

heyngel said...

By the way, the method of computing the standings has not changed, it is not based on total medals, its based on the quality of the medals- so as usual the country at the top is the one with the most gold medals. just so you know

hhhmmm

8-21-2008 @ 4:04AM

Kuhne said...

Just deal with the fact that China will come on top of the USA in these olympics (and probably the ones to come) China gets more gold medals in every olympics than they did in the last. Atlanta, Sydney, Athens and now Beijing, each time their gold grows more and more.

Honestly Americans, deal with it now or be blind about it, your choise, but it's going to hurt a lot more when these olympics are done and china has 10 more gold medals than you.

8-21-2008 @ 8:35PM

Chazmo said...

I think anyone who actually cares who has the most gold medals or the most overall medals is the real loser. Come on - the last time I cared about something as unimportant and irrelevant and meaningless as what country gets the most medals or the most gold medals or whatever, I was 14 years old. If my city's foodball team wins the championship, does that make me better than anyone else? Does the "winner" of the Olympic medal count or gold medal count mean that they are superior in sports? Of course not! The IOC is a joke and the Olympics, when seen for what they really are, are quite disgusting because idiologically - they're supposed to be about the triumph of the human spirit. Instead, they're used as political tools and as a way for lots of insecure people to feel better about themselves - when they see their race (ethnically speaking) "win" ... I couldn't care less and can't even believe I wasted 5 minutes of my life writing this! lol!!!

8-22-2008 @ 11:34AM

Don said...

American as a country is getting fatter, lazier, and less interested in sports except from the couch.

8-21-2008 @ 2:43PM

steve adams said...

I find the medal distribution interesting. In most countries (US, Russia, Germany, Australia) with enough medals to make analysis reasonable you see an even distribution between the medals. - Larger countries, bigger, broader youth sports participation more medals all around. Makes sense. But for China you see a big lump of golds. The count is high enough that there must be a factor driving this. Do they not sponsor people that are not the best 1 or 2 in the event? Is there some other driver? The odds of this coming from a random distribution of participants would seem to be pretty small. FWIW

8-26-2008 @ 10:47AM

Crazy88 said...

The Olympic website says that the IOC medal tally chart is based on the number of gold medals for country. Where states are equal, the number of silver medals (and then bronze medals) are counted to determine rankings. Get over yourself Americans. You always have an excuse when you lose. You had a good run. Just admit that you lost these olympics with some dignity. What do you expect from a country that names a sport football when only about 5% of the game is played with your feet? At least you're finally going to reclaim the gold medal in basketball. So it's not all bad.

8-25-2008 @ 2:42AM

Dan said...

Americans are as usual sore losers. I dont see the Chinese or Russians complain when they lose an event, but if a non-american were to win, lo and behold, the Americans would be accusing them of cheating and having unfair advantages. Its always the same story over and over. It gets so sickening. Where is the sportsmanship? You should read the American papers. When they win, they "blew away the competition" but when they lose, "the judges were bought" or "the IOC sucked" etc etc. They even had to rearrange the way medals were counted so as to continue to feel "superior". Look we got the most medals, so we "win". It is so pathetic. Grow up and stop behaving like a spoiled brat and a sore loser.