Infostrada’s medal table predictions noted that they expect 26 NOCs to win medals, which would equal the record of Torino 2006 and Vancouver 2010. How many nations have won medals at each Winter Olympics? And how many have won gold medals at each Winter Olympics? Here are the numbers, along with numbers of events available, and the number of competing NOCs.

Year          Events        NOCs    NOCMeds  NOCGolds

1908        4 events               6                    4                   4

1920        4 events             10                   7                   3

1924      16 events             16                10                  8

1928      14 events             25                12                  6

1932      14 events             17                10                  7

1936      17 events             28                11                  8

1948      22 events             28                13               10

1952      22 events             30                13                  8

1956      24 events             32                13                  9

1960      27 events             30                14               10

1964      34 events             36                14               11

1968      35 events             37                15               13

1972      35 events             35                17               14

1976      37 events             37                16               12

1980      38 events             37                19               11

1984      39 events             49                17               11

1988      46 events             57                17               11

1992      57 events             64                20               14

1994      61 events             67                22               14

1998      68 events             72                24               15

2002      78 events             77                24               18

2006      84 events             79                26               18

2010      86 events             82                26               19

For the record, there will be 98 events in Sochi 2014, and we expect about 90 NOCs to compete, although final qualifications and entry lists will not be known in all sports until 19 January.

There are 7 nations that we expect will be competing in the Winter Olympics for the first time – Eritrea, Malta, Paraguay, Timor-Leste (East Timor), Togo, Tonga, and Zimbabwe. Six of the seven have definitely qualified an athlete for Sochi, and Eritrea has a male skiier who is right on the cusp of qualifying – Canadian-born Shannon-Ogbani Abeda.

There are 6 nations that have previously competed at the Winter Olympics who will likely not compete, as follows: Colombia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Senegal, and South Africa. The 6^th is North Korea (technically the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, or DPR Korea), although we await word on whether or not Dennis Rodman will be able to switch to a winter sport at the last minute.

You’ll learn more next week when we start publishing our Factsheets on the Winter Competing Nations.