Going for Gold (and Silver, and Bronze)

Every four years the world gets caught up in the excitement of the Olympics.  (Do you remember when the summer and winter games took place in the same year?)  This year the 2012 Summer Olympics are taking place in London and we'll be watching!  Nicole's favorite events are swimming, diving, and gymnastics, while Rob, not surprisingly, loves football (soccer to you Yanks).  While we wait to see who will be standing on the podium, here are some fun facts about the shiny medals the winners will be wearing:  

2012 London (Summer) Olympics - Gold, Silver, and Bronze Medals

• At the 2008 Summer Olympics, China won 51 gold medals, the most of any nation, and led the gold medal count for the first time in Olympic history. The United States won the most medals overall with a total of 110.
  
  (Wikipedia - 2008 Summer Olympics Medal Table)
  
• Larysa Latynina is the only athlete, in any sport, to have a collection of 18 Olympic medals, including nine gold. The Ukrainian gymnast won six medals at each of the three editions of the Games in which she participated.  Lining up the records, she is also the only person to have won 14 medals in individual events. 
  
  (Olympic.org - Official website of the Olympic Movement)

       

• The Olympic medals are designed especially for each individual Olympic Games by the host city's organizing committee. Each medal must be at least three millimeters thick and 60 millimeters in diameter. Also, the gold and silver Olympic medals must be made out of 92.5 percent silver, with the gold medal covered in six grams of gold.
• The last Olympic gold medals that were made entirely out of gold were awarded in 1912.
• When the United States' James B. Connolly won the "hop, step, and jump" (the first final event in the 1896 Olympics), he became the first champion of the modern Olympic Games.
  
  (About.com - Interesting Olympic Facts)