The Summer Olympics in Paris captivated the world, with iconic gold medals awarded to top athletes symbolize victory and excellence. With the Paralympics about to start, here are 14 fascinating and fun facts about Olympic gold medals that you can share with friends!
1. No one won gold in the first modern Olympics!
In the 1896 Athens Games, winners received silver medals, while second place got bronze. Gold medals weren’t introduced until 1904.
2. Solid gold, once upon a time
From 1904 to 1912, Olympic gold medals were made of solid gold. Today, they are mostly silver with a gold plating. A solid gold medal today would be worth about ~USD $44,615 (~AUD $68,544).
3. Move over, Simone Biles
Although Simone Biles is the greatest gymnast of all time, George Eyser achieved something she hasn’t! At the 1904 St Louis games, George won 3 solid gold medals for gymnastics – despite his wooden leg!
4. Michael Phelps’ golden diet
Michael Phelps is the most awarded Olympic athlete with 23 golds. To maintain peak performance, he consumed a whopping 12,000 calories a day during training. That’s the equivalent of 92 grilled chicken breasts or 387 cups of chopped broccoli a day (we’re sure his diet was more varied than that!).
5. Biting the medal
Winning athletes are often photographed biting their medals. This tradition stems from the ancient practice of biting into gold to test its purity and authenticity, as pure gold is soft enough to dent with pressure from a human bite. With only 6g of gold plating on modern medals, this is purely for show (and requested by photographers!).
6. Most medals per capita
Although Australia did really well this year (coming fourth on the table of gold medalists), we are not the most successful country when you look at medals per capita. In the Paris Olympics, the small Caribbean country of Grenada won two medals, making them the most successful per capita with one medal for every 56,289 people!.
7. Gold medal and unbroken record
Beamon’s 1968 long jump not only won him a gold medal, but his record leap of 8.90 meters remains unbroken for over 50 years.
8. Katie Ledecky and Emma McKeon: golden swimming legends
Katie Ledecky has become the most decorated U.S. female Olympic athlete, with 14 medals, including 9 golds. Australia’s Emma McKeon has won 6 gold medals, bringing her lifetime Olympic medal tally to 14, making her the most successful Australian Olympian.
9. Tarzan wins Olympic gold!
Johnny Weissmuller, famous for playing Tarzan in movies in the 1930s and 1940s, won five gold medals in swimming during the 1920s before his acting career.
10. Gold medalists take home a piece of Paris
The 2024 Paris medals each include an 18-gram piece of iron from the Eiffel Tower, adding a touch of French heritage and making them truly unique.
11. The first women’s gold
In the 1900 Paris Olympics, women competed for the first time. English tennis player Charlotte Cooper became the first female gold medalist ever (women were only admitted to the games in 1900).
12. Gold world ranking
The United States holds the record for the most Olympic gold medals won by a single country, with 1,126 golds overall and 2,827 overal medals since the beginning of the modern games!
13. Oldest and youngest gold medallists
Oscar Swahn from Sweden became the oldest gold medallist at age 64 in the 1912 Olympics in shooting (and this year, Laura Kraut, part of the USA equestrian team, just missed out on taking that title, winning silver at the age of 72!). The youngest gold medallist in history is Marjorie Gestring, who won gold in diving for the USA team at just 13 years old during the 1936 Berlin Games. This year, the youngest gold medallist is Australian 14 year old Arisa Trew, who has won the first ever gold medal in skateboarding!
14. Gold medal sharing
During the 1936 Berlin Games, two Japanese pole-vaulters tied for second place. Instead of competing again, they cut their silver and bronze medals in half and fused the two different halves together so each had a half-silver, half-bronze medal. Now that’s collaboration!
How many of these did you know?
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