FlagAndMap Weblog

How much impact can an individual athlete have at a multi-national sports competition? The answer is considerable if you follow our 2010 Commonwealth Games GDP Adjusted Medals Ranking. After factoring in late results from day 3 of the event, the top spot in our ranking was seized by Uganda and it was all down to Moses Ndiema Kipsiro who won the men’s 5000m event.

The GDP adjustment in our ranking attempts to create a more equitable comparison between all the competing nations. One consequence of this is that individual athletes from smaller nations can have a much greater impact. Nevertheless we feel that in the case of Moses Kipsiro such recognition is fully deserved. The guy was leading at the bell (after 4,600m) and still held off three strong Kenyans at a sprint for the entire final 400m – awesome. So Moses Kipsiro deserves special congratulations and of course all the athletes competing at these games deserve our support and admiration.

A quarter of the world’s population potentially has an interest in the 2010 Commonwealth Games currently being held in Delhi. 71 ‘nations’ (including sub-nations) are being represented in this multi-national sporting competition, which occurs every four years. These nations range from the immense, India with a population of 1.18 million, to the tiny, Tuvalu with a population of just 12,000. The larger and the more affluent nations will be expected to win most of the medals but we wondered if it would be possible to compare the performance of such disparate nations on anything like an equitable basis.

After some thought and experimentation we have settled on a ranking based on a ‘Medals Value’ which is divided by the GDP of the nation. Our Medals Value deems each medal to be worth slightly more than twice that of the one below it (12pts for a gold, 5pts for a silver and 2pts for a bronze) while the GDP adjustment takes account of both the population and affluence of a nation. The resulting GDP Adjusted Medals Ranking for the 2010 Commonwealth Games will be updated at the end of each day of competition.

We like to think this ranking methodology gives any nation the chance to finish top. In fact we think it might actually favor smaller nations if by chance they happen to be fielding a few exception athletes this year. Indeed, this could be the Isle of Man’s year if Mark Cavendish wins a cycling gold. No matter which nation you are rooting for, have a little fun by tracking their position in our GDP Adjusted Medals Ranking.