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Sports shooter Alessandra Perilli won bronze in the trap, silver in the mixed trap - and thus two of the three Olympic medals for San Marino in Tokyo
Photo:
RITCHIE B. TONGO / EPA
The Tokyo Summer Olympics are over.
In the medal table, there was a duel between China and the USA at the top until the end.
After the last decision, the American team is not only at the top, for the third time in a row, with the usual count - with a total of 113 medals, the USA also won by far the most medals in terms of width.
The team of the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) has won five fewer medals than five years ago in Rio de Janeiro, in the classic medal table that means a decline of four places from fifth to nine.
The discussions about the sports system in Germany are picking up speed, the DOSB with President Alfons Hörmann is not doing well.
If we stick to the overall balance, this is what the medal table looks like after 339 competitions:
The medal table also includes discussions about the usefulness of the previous counting method.
Saber fencer Max Hartung, who has been critical of German sport as athletes' spokesman for years, recently pleaded for a different perspective in an interview with Die Zeit: more individual, less focused on records, more focused on the athletes.
Looking at the bigger picture, it might be fairer to let every medal count.
Gold would then be worth as much as silver and bronze.
Then there would have been at least one place swap at the top in Tokyo, the Japanese hosts would have ended up in fifth place:
It might be even more balanced to include both the total number of medals and the slightly higher value of the gold medals.
There would be such a change in the top 15, the German team would fall back to ninth place.
It becomes more interesting when you compare the economic performance of the countries with the medal wins at the Olympic Games. Then Germany would be in 77th place, the USA only in 82nd place - and San Marino would be enthroned at the top. The republic, surrounded by Italy, has a population of just 34,000, five of whom qualified for Tokyo.
San Marino sent a team to the Olympics for the 15th time and has managed to win medals for the first time. Sports shooter Alessandra Perilli took bronze in the trap on the fifth day of the competition. "I don't know what's going on at home now," the 32-year-old told the Italian news agency Ansa. “Am I a heroine? Now don't exaggerate! «Three days later, Perilli followed suit and won silver in the mixed trap with Gian Marco Berti, and wrestler Myles Amine won bronze.
Not surprisingly, San Marino would also be at the top of the medal table if the yield were converted to the number of inhabitants.
In the top 15, the Netherlands and Australia are also two countries that are ahead of Germany in the current ranking.
The Dutch team collected 36 medals from a population of just 17.5 million.
How big are Olympic teams actually?
The USA provided the largest team with 648 athletes.
This is followed by Japan (619), Australia (491), China (425), Germany (422) and France (400).
San Marino drove to Tokyo with only five participants.
Bermuda sent Dara Alizadeh (rowing) an athlete and Flora Duffy an athlete to the games.
Duffy won the gold medal in the triathlon - and would have brought the small island nation in the Atlantic to the top of another medal table.
However the medals are classified: Germany will not be among the winners after the Olympics in 2021.
