It completely trounced the previous two records: a silver cup from the first modern Olympics and a gold medal from the so-called 1980 “Miracle on Ice”, when the us upset the powerhouse U.S.S.R.in ice hockey. But for the athletes competing in more obscure or less lucrative sports that only get this kind of major national or worldwide attention once every four years, those paychecks can make a huge difference in their lives.
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Since the visualisation was published on 8 August, Phelps has won another three gold medals, putting his total count at 22 gold medals – ahead of the previous record-holder, Leonidas of Rhodes, who reigned supreme for over 2,000 years.
Using data from the Olympic Data Feed, the BBC finds people’s closest “body match” among 10,500 athletes. “For North Koreans, they’re worse”.
And when the U.S. Olympic Committee says per medal, they mean it. And then there’s money given by outside groups to medal winners.
Then, there’s the option to sell the actual medals themselves.
If you’re at the top of the podium and the Singaporean national anthem plays – which would be a first: of the four medals the country’s Olympians have ever won, not one has been gold – you’ll walk away with glory and a $753,000 bonus.
American Simone Biles put in a sparkling performance to win the women’s all-around final and claim the second of a potential five gold medals at Rio 2016 on Thursday.
One commonly cited figure for the worth of a gold medal is about $500, the price you’d get if you melted the thing down and sold it to a dealer. Indeed, collectors are often after Olympic medals (some that were owned by athletes, and others that were never awarded), though the values vary greatly based on many factors. A Michael Phelps Olympic Gold Medal would go for far more at an auction house. It is actually a common enough occurrence that at the Sochi Olympics, there were 46 extra gold medals on hand just in case ties happened.
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FT’s John Burn-Murdoch took on the task of determining whether Michael Phelps is the most successful athlete at the Olympic Games in modern history, and how someone would even measure this.
