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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]If you did research, you would find that many countries give their athletes who win gold a lot more than the US does. I read that the US comes in 9th in that regard. OP, I strongly encourage you to research things  before making generalizations. The US has 300 million people. So the odds are we will have more winners.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]So much dis-information here. If you fools had to live on the budgets of most US athletes, you would starve to death. Don't mistake a few stars for the majority of the pack.

And, don't forget the winter Olympics. The US never has the most medals in that.[/quote]

Pp here. I didn't mean that the athletes have money. But they do have access to facilities and coaches etc. and those gymnastics classes for little girls are expensive. Someone has to drive to those classes and go to meets etc. it's not that athletes are living like kings. They are working very hard yes, but with far better equipment and support than other countries for the most part. [/quote][/quote]

The Singaporean swimmer who beat Phelps gets nearly $1 million for his gold, while Phelps gets $25,000. Phelps obviously gets some of his commercial power back after he was dropped by a few sponsors after his DUI. But Schooling may do well in endorsements as well.[/quote]

That's post Olympic money.  Did that athlete have phelps money pre-olympics?[/quote]

Um, I don't think Joseph Schooling (the Singaporean swimmer) is a good example.  He went to boarding school in Jacksonville, FL and attends the University of TX, Austin, where he's on the swim team with several of our Olympic swimmers (e.g., Townley Haas, Jack Conger).  UT has won the NCAA title for the past two years, I believe.  In other words, Schooling has been trained like all the Americans...

As for why we have more medals, swimming is a big part of it.  USA Swimming has 400,000 members.  There are more kids swimming in the U.S. than some of these countries have in total.  We are a big country and we care a lot about sports.  People think (usually, wrongly) that having their kids play sports will help them get a college scholarship.  In other countries, where college is free, they don't have that motivator.  Plus, as a PP said, we emphasize sports for our girls more than in some other parts of the world.  I'm not sure why anyone is surprised by the number of medals we've won.

But, let's not forget how hard our athletes work (as I'm sure athletes from other parts of the world do too).  Katie Ledecky is the most dominant swimmer in the world for several reasons.  But one big reason is because she trains 30 hours/week.  While she may have access to great coaches, etc., she also works her butt off, and I don't think we should diminish that in any way.

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