The Olympic Games are here and, once again, the United States is dominating.
Thus far, the United States has accumulated 27 medals total, including 10 gold, eight silver and nine bronze. The Chinese have amassed the second highest total with 17 medals.
The Summer Olympics have been officially occurring every four years since 1896. So in order to determine which country is the most athletically dominant, it’s only fair that we go back in time and look at who has acquired the most medals throughout history.
Here are the medal counts for the ten most victorious nations over the last 120 years.
GOLD SILVER BRONZE TOTAL
1. United States 986 763 675 2426
2. Soviet Union 440 357 325 1122
3. Germany 259 305 334 898
4. England 237 275 274 786
5. France 204 226 247 677
6. Italy 201 169 187 558
7. China 209 147 134 490
8. Sweden 144 166 176 486
9. Hungary 171 145 166 482
10. Australia 142 153 182 477
Of course, as I write this, the games in Rio are underway, so chances are that this list will look somewhat different by the end of next week. But, obviously, the Americans have been the dominant force in world athletics since the Olympic games began. (This despite the fact that several of the communist nations, such as the Soviet Union and China had their athletes pumped up on steroids for a significant portion of the late 20th century.)
Additionally, it is important to note that the Soviet Union ceased to exist in the early 90's, so it’s unclear how many medals their competitors would have won over the last 30 years had communism not been relegated to the ash heap of history.