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Ester's avatar

This was smart and fun to read, thank you! My one note: When you said, "The United States outperformed expectations and captured one of the most visible moments of the Games with its hockey victory," you meant "victories," right?

Jadrian Wooten's avatar

Good catch! I'll edit that right now.

JD Champagne's avatar

Who won the Winter Olympics?

Everyone who got to watch curling

Economics on a pentagram's avatar

That’s very interesting! I also wrote yesterday something related to Norway and why they are able to over perform and producing such a strong outcome. Curiously enough even in other sports (football) they are at their best. Finally I am curious about the absence among the overachievers of Brazil whose gold medal seems very similar to Jamaica story. Although the athlete was indeed half Norwegian !

https://open.substack.com/pub/pierfrancescoservidio/p/the-winter-monarchy-of-roses?r=1rsvc6&utm_medium=ios

Jadrian Wooten's avatar

I've defined overachievers only based on the size of the gap between the number of medals won and the number predicted. At least for the 2026 Olympics, they're not much of an overachiever. The model predicted they wouldn't win any medals, and they walked away with 1 medal.