Is a gold medal all that matters?

interesting (US)

While China has a number of advantages, a larger team, a massive athletics infrastructure, a larger population to work from, over the US, its major disadvantage is that its strategy is to expand its medal count by entering high-yield sports like rowing to a greater degree. The disadvantage there isn't anything which is China's fault, it is merely that many countries are trying to do the same thing, the US and Russia included. So China's medal strategy could backfire and it will take home fewer medals because the field is so fractured amongst the different teams. This is actually true across all sports and there is a not insignificant chance of a falling medal total for the top countries in the long run.

China's Ding Ning serves against her compatriot Li Xiaoxia during the women's singles gold medal match of table tennis at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Aug. 10, 2016. Ding Ning won the gold medal. [Photo/Xinhua]