Canada Wins The Pot At The Olympics

In the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver this past month, our country has proudly won the most number of Gold Medals ever won by a singly country during Winter Olympics and achieved dominance in our sport. Our neighbours to the south are claiming dominance over the games having won the highest medal count.
As I was glued to my TV or computer screen watching almost every event, I noticed a trend where Canadian Athletes continuously finished 4th and 5th in a large number of events.  I thought for sure that if there were Copper (4th) and Zinc (5th) medals, Canada would most certainly be in the lead, so now since the games have wrapped up and medal tallies are final, I decided to create my own medal count which included 4th and 5th place in the total count.
I was surprised to see that the overall standings didn’t change much although Canada came 2nd instead of 3rd and had double the amount of 5th place finishes than any other country at the games.
Another interesting look at the medal count comes from an article in “The New York Times” which examines the market value of each medal handed out.  The article states the Gold Plated medal is worth $537, and the 92.5% Silver medal is valued at $300 while the Bronze medal is mostly copper and is worth only $3.40. Taking this information into account, if the medal count is re-evaluated based on total market value, Canada comes in first place with a total value of $9635 with the US coming in second at $9377.  If you count every medal won by a country, including one for each player on a team, like every hockey player, Canada earned $41,043 while the US only brought home $25,719.   Included is a table with the medal count including copper and zinc!