Who was the World’s Fastest Nation at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games? USA or Jamaica?
Jamaica had introduced the Fastest Nation Jamaica T-shirt
Let’s take a look at the 7 sprint events that require starting blocks:
Here are a few random thoughts that come to mind:
- USA owns the Men’s 400 meters and 400mH with 7 out of the possible 7 medals
- Usain Bolt won all of the 3 medals for the Men’s (though one came from a relay)
- The Women’s 200 meters could have gone either way with USA and Jamaica with 3 finalist each! Allyson Felix saved the day for the Americans
- Come to your own conclusions!
I say Jamacia won.
They took Gold in the men’s and women’s 100 and 200, the USA only took Gold in the Men’s 400. The USA had the most 2nd and 3rd fastest people.
The same as the medal count, China Won more gold or won more events than any other country while the USA has the largest amount of losers.
@Adarian – Also, China being the host country, they probably entered the maximum number of athletes in ALL the events.
This may not have made a difference in Athletics, but certainly the least popular sports such as Trampoline.
Could you also do it per capita?
@John – well, Jamaica being 2.8 million people and the USA with 305 million, I think you get the picture… I wonder what the key to success? It’s not like Usain Bolt went to a NCAA Div 1 school…
How many world records were broken by Americans and how many by Jamaicans?
How many times were Jamaicans tested for steroids and how many times were Americans tested? With the amount of blood that was taken from Jamaicans for random tests, it’s a miracle they were able to stand, let alone run, win gold medals and break world records…
And, as somebody before me said, how many gold medals were won by Jamaicans and how many by Americans?
@Vladimir – I think I get your point :o)
UPDATE – Carl Lewis has his theories why Jamaica is running so well these days:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writers/arash_markazi/09/11/carl.lewis/