With its medal sweep in today’s women’s 1,500 metre speed skating, the Netherlands has now won 16 medals in speed skating (long-track) at Sochi. If you include short-track, all 17 of their medals in Sochi have come in speed skating.
This is a new record for the most medals won by a nation in a single sport at the Winter Olympics. The previous record was 14 by Austria in 2006 Alpine Skiing, with the Soviet Union winning 13 in cross-country skiing in 1988 and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) also winning 13 in 1988, in speed skating. Here are all the times a nation has won 10 or more medals in a single sport at one Winter Olympics.
[table]
NOC,Year,Sport,G,S,B,TM
Netherlands,2014,Speedskating,5,5,6,16
Austria,2006,Alpine Skiing,4,5,5,14
Soviet Union,1988,Cross-Country Skiing,5,5,3,13
German Demo. Rep.,1988,Speedskating,3,6,4,13
Soviet Union,1960,Speedskating,6,3,3,12
Soviet Union,1964,Speedskating,5,5,2,12
German Demo. Rep.,1984,Speedskating,4,4,3,11
Switzerland,1988,Alpine Skiing,3,4,4,11
Germany,1992,Speedskating,5,3,3,11
Austria,1998,Alpine Skiing,3,4,4,11
Netherlands,1998,Speedskating,5,4,2,11
Norway,2002,Cross-Country Skiing,5,2,4,11
Germany,2006,Biathlon,5,4,2,11
Soviet Union,1976,Cross-Country Skiing,4,2,4,10
Korea,2006,Short-Track Speedskating,6,3,1,10
[/table]
In the women’s 1,500 metres today, the Netherlands actually went 1-2-3-4. This was the 3rd medal sweep by the Netherlands in speed skating at these Olympics, making it the first nation to ever sweep the medals 3 times at a Winter Olympics.
No, it is not the first time that a nation has swept places1-4 at the Winter Olympics – its actually the 7th time this has happened. But it is the first time it has happened in speed skating. The other 6 times were as follows:
[table]
Sport,Year,ORISCode,Gdr,NOC
Cross-Country Skiing,1924,50 kilometres,M,NOR
Cross-Country Skiing,1936,50 kilometres,M,SWE
Cross-Country Skiing,1960,10 kilometres,F,URS
Luge,1972,Singles,M,GDR
Nordic Combined,1924,Individual,M,NOR
Nordic Combined,1932,Individual,M,NOR
[/table]