(ATR) Now that the Rio 2016 Summer Olympic Games have come to an end, it's time to look back and see which countries were at the top of the podium when it came to meeting expectations.
Gracenote Sports produced a virtual medal count table on the eve of Rio 2016 that predicted the number of medals each country was supposed to win.
The United States finished at the top of the table, as expected, but with a total medal haul of 121, exceeding predictions by a whopping 33 medals.
This year's haul ranks as the third largest medal count of any Games for the U.S., behind only 1904 in St. Louis and 1984 in Los Angeles.
Russia also trumped Gracenote's predictions, winning 56 medals overall, 14 more than predicted. Russia repeated their London 2012 results placing 4th on the medal table.
Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev is confident that Russian athletes would have more victories at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
"Our common hope now is for the 2020 Olympic Games," Medvedev states. "I am sure that we will win there more medals and our national squad will be a competitive and powerful team."
Prime Minister Medvedev also believes the IOC's decision which led to a ban of some athletes as a result of systemic doping in Russia affected this years medal count.
"We have no doubt that, but for this unfair decision, they would have succeeded making a significant contribution to our total medals count."
Despite criticism involving a major doping scandal, Russia has turned that negative into a positive by rewarding all Olympic medalists in the Rio 2016 Games with a new BMW.
While some countries greatly exceeded Gracenote's expectations, others fell short.
The host country of Brazil won its fair share of medals these past Games with 19 total, placing 13th on the Olympic medal table.
According to Gracenote, Brazil fell one medal shy of where they were supposed to finish.
Despite that, this has been the country's biggest medal total in Olympic history, beating their last medal count at the London 2012 Games by two.
China suffered a drop in performance placing third in the Olympic medal table winning 70 medals overall, one less than predicted. During the 2008 Beijing Games China topped the rankings for the first time with 56 golds. At London 2012, it ranked second to the US with 38 golds and 87 overall.
Sports ministerLiu Peng made comments on the number of medals stating"winning gold medals is not the only target, but it’s still essential for Chinese athletes to "glorify the country" with better performances".
According to Gracenote sports, Singapore was not expected to medal at all during these games. The entire world was stunned asJoseph Schooling of Singapore defeated Michael Phelps and claimed gold during the men's 100m butterfly giving the country its first gold medal.
Singapore was not the only country to win their first gold.
As predicted, Fiji won its first Olympic medal - a gold - in rugby. The country erupted in celebration declaring Aug. 22 a national holiday after their amazing win.
A total of 73 countries have still never won an Olympic medal.
Homepage photo: Getty Images
Written by Courtney Colquitt
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