![]() ![]() However, the number of athletes from Asia jumped from 144 in 1994 to 335 at the very next Games in 1998 in Nagano, Japan. The participation dropped a bit at the 1994 Games in Lillehammer, Norway, as those were the first Games at which stricter qualifying standards were implemented. It should be noted that, over the years, the participation of Asian countries in the Winter Olympics has steadily increased as well. She represented Japan in figure skating, and was only 12 years old! The first woman to participate in the Winter Olympics from Asia was Etsuko Inada in 1936, at the Games held in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany. However, since the medal was awarded to the mixed team, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) doesn’t recognize it as an official medal of the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Nepal. A group of seven men from India and one from Nepal, named Tejbir Bura, participated as a team in the mixed alpinism event and won a Gold medal! Interestingly, it is the only Gold medal that Nepal has ever won. The first Winter Olympics were held in 1924 in Chamonix, France, where 258 athletes from 16 nations competed in 16 events. Women’s participation rose rapidly after the 1980 Moscow Games, and by 2016, when the Games were held in Rio de Janeiro, the number of women athletes, at 892 (47.8%), was nearly equal to the number of men, at 975 (52.2%). She was both the first and the only woman from Asia to participate that year. The first woman from Asia to participate in the Olympics was Nora Margaret Polley at the 1924 Games held in Paris. Participation was further reduced in 1980 when 65 nations boycotted the Moscow Games in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The slight drop in Asian participation in 1976 was because Iraq and Sri Lanka joined 22 African nations in boycotting the Games, refusing to participate alongside New Zealand, whose rugby team had toured South Africa that summer, breaking an international sports embargo against that country due to its apartheid policy. Participation dropped at the Montreal Games in 1976 and the Moscow Games in 1980. The Games were again canceled in 19 due to World War II. ![]() The Olympic Games were canceled in 1916 due to World War I. The rise and fall in the number of participants over the years mirrors the major events of modern history. Pritchard won two Silver medals for India in the men’s 200m and 200m hurdles events. They were Firidun Malkom Khan from Iran and Norman Gilbert Pritchard from India ii. The first athletes from Asia to compete in the Summer Olympic Games were two men who took part in the 1900 Olympics held in Paris. Asia and Africa, where approximately 80% of the world population resides, have each won three medals per 10 million people. Another interesting point is that, looking at the number of medals won relative to population, Oceania dominates every other continent by a huge margin, with 155 medals per 10 million people (Chart 2). The majority of these have gone to the same three countries: China with 595 medals (29.1%) Japan with 482 (23.6%) and South Korea with 316 (15.5%). With respect to medals, Asia has won 1,848, or 9.8% of the total. A majority of the 12.8% of Asian participants have come from only three countries: Japan (24%), China (15%), and South Korea (13%). On the other hand, more than half of the participants (57.2%) have come from Europe, which has only about 10% of the world population. It is worth noting that even though 66% of the world population today resides in Asia i, only 12.8% of participants have come from Asia. The above bar charts show the population in the five continents of the world, as well as the number of Olympics participants and the number of medals won in each continent.
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