Is there money in… an Olympic gold medal?

Bryce: [00:00:15] Equity Mates. It is Bryce and Ren here and and we're super pumped because we're at the third episode of Is there money in and Ren it is over to you. 

Alec: [00:00:25] Yeah, you guys went down the media route and that makes sense. You guys are media guys. Ed's in radio, you're in podcasting. So Ed asked about music and you asked about YouTube. May When you think of May, you think athlete, you think top of his game winning gold and running for his country. And so it was only natural that when it was my turn to bring a topic to the table, I asked, Is there money in Olympic gold? 

Bryce: [00:00:54] Yeah. Fascinating conversation. Not one I had any clue of before we went into this. I always thought that the money was in the medal itself. 

Alec: [00:01:02] But. 

Bryce: [00:01:04] Let's see where it lands in this episode.

Alec: [00:01:06] Let's find out. 

Ed: [00:01:13] And welcome back into. Is there any money on YouTube? Yes. Asterix, is there any money music? Yes. We have a live concert and we have a track at Bryce, Ren Boys. We've got our first single out in the world, Daryl Braithwaite, featuring Snoop Dogg, The Horses 2023, which is exciting, but we move on and move on and we are about to find out. 

Alec: [00:01:41] Is there any money in Olympic gold? 

Ed: [00:01:44] This is great. 

Bryce: [00:01:45] Nice. 

Alec: [00:01:46] Now, the first two episodes we've done this, there's been clear actions. You know, we've been able to make a song, we've been able to make a YouTube account. So I expect one of us to go for gold out of this episode. All right. 

Ed: [00:02:00] Well, what's that? What's that? Andrew Hoy was the oldest. Was he the equestrian? He was in his fifties.

Bryce: [00:02:05] So that's still about like Eight Olympics or something. The number came out, 25 years.

Ed: [00:02:09] I think so, yeah. And then shooting. It's hard to pick up a shotgun. Yes. All right. 

Alec: [00:02:18] So now it's important to know when we're looking at this. Up until 1971, there was no money in the Olympics whatsoever. Well, at least for the athletes, because you had to be an amateur. That changed in the seventies and there's heaps of money in the Olympics now covered in sponsorships. NBC in the US paid 7.7 billion for broadcast rights between 2021 and 2032. The IOC, the International Olympic Committee, makes between three and 4 billion per Olympics. Yeah 3 to 4 billion. 

Ed: [00:02:51] So it's going down because you know how Brisbane got the Olympics. So my mum worked on the original Brisbane Olympic bid for 1992, right where we got laughed at. And now Brisbane got handed the Olympics because no one else wanted it. 

Bryce: [00:03:04] That's because having the last few Olympics just been an absolute.

Alec: [00:03:08] Yeah, you lose a lot of money on the Olympics, but I think there's probably two separate conversations. One is, is it worth it for a city to host the Olympics, and then the other is when it's on, do you get eyeballs? Because that's that's the driver our revenue who who like the, you know, TV networks around the world around the world, pay for broadcast rights and then advertisers paid a stick. So so 3 to $4 billion. So surely some of that money goes to athletes. You would think in Tokyo there were 11,000 athletes competing in the Olympics and 4000 athletes competing in the Paralympics. 

Bryce: [00:03:42] I'm a thousand way more than I thought for some reasons. Right at the start, there's like 16 people come out for that. 

Alec: [00:03:48] No, I think that wasn't a covered, interrupted opening ceremony? 

Bryce: [00:03:53] I actually don't remember watching a lot of the last Olympics now.

Ed: [00:03:55] Tokyo. I remember it being hot and I remember them having to continuously say the skateboarding was coming up and then it was just 14 year olds falling over. So I'm like, I can watch that at the park. 

Bryce: [00:04:08] It didn't sound like. 

Ed: [00:04:11] Yeah, Australian guy from America and we had him on. Have you been paying attention? And the second before we were going on he was ushering his I think it was his girlfriend, but certainly a young lady that he was with out of his room as she complained to why I got the new TV babe that. 

Alec: [00:04:27] So I just remember not being into feeling, not feeling into the Olympics. And then when it started being like, Oh yeah. 

Ed: [00:04:41] What do you got? What do you top three? 

Alec: [00:04:44] So obviously, like the big sports, like swimming. 

Ed: [00:04:46] No. Your top three. 

Alec: [00:04:48] But I love the sports that I'll never ever watch again. Like the super nature stuff. My general rule on the Olympics is any sport where the pinnacle of the sport isn't The Olympics shouldn't be. 

Ed: [00:05:01] Oh, this is an age old debate. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:05:05] So it's like, get them out of here. And just all I want is people whose life is about the Olympics, like kayaking and stuff like this. 

Bryce: [00:05:13] Sport isn't the pinnacle. Any sport that has the pinnacle as their Olympics is a dying sport. 

Alec: [00:05:19] Well, that's what we're going to get into today, Bryce? Because if you don't have an NBA contract or you haven't won at Roland Garros and the tennis is their money and winning this. 

Bryce: [00:05:30] Track cycling is my number one goal if I was to go to the Olympics.

Alec: [00:05:34] As we're finding in this series, every episode we learn something new about Bryce. And he was an almost professional track cyclist. He was almost at the Olympics for track cycling. 

Bryce: [00:05:46] Yeah. Anyway

Ed: [00:05:47] So the Velodrome. 

Bryce: [00:05:49] Velodrome. Yeah. 

Ed: [00:05:51] What the hell. Which, what, what were your distances. 

Bryce: [00:05:54] Are short, short and sharp. 

Ed: [00:05:55] What was this short. What was the longest short distance you would do.

Bryce: [00:05:58] I think the time trial was like 5K. 

Ed: [00:06:02] But what was your Best like? 

Bryce: [00:06:05] Oh, five laps. 

Ed: [00:06:07] And so, you Know, are you a fast runner? 

Bryce: [00:06:09] Efficient, not hate running. 

Ed: [00:06:10] See, that is the interesting thing because that short twitch muscle fibres. Right. The for fast running, but it often doesn't correlate into the ability to have that short twitch slightly longer for cycling. It's not often you get someone who's a really fast sprinter and very fast at sprinting on a bike.

Bryce: [00:06:27] Well.

Alec: [00:06:28] If you were good at running, you just didn't like it. How'd you get into track cycling?

Bryce: [00:06:33] I had been riding around this. I Started riding a bike super, super young and just loved it. And then when we moved to Wagga, Dad knew a few mates and hit their sons were doing track cycling and Wagga's a big sports town and we had a velodrome there and just got into it. 

Ed: [00:06:53] And there were people going, Oh, so I'm coming to do it more properly. Yes. And that type of field.

Bryce: [00:07:00] Yeah. Yeah. Well yeah. Made it to like nationals and was in the rep squad. 

Alec: [00:07:04] So it's pretty good to have. 

Bryce: [00:07:05] All those sorts of Things. 

Alec: [00:07:06] I mean I didn't know him then, but he tells me it was pretty and there are no records in Wagga 

Bryce: [00:07:16] So I d ro. 

Alec: [00:07:17] 3 to $4 billion for the International Olympic Committee. Now if we look at other sports, a percentage of money goes to athletes. So in the NFL, 48% of the money the NFL brings in goes to hire in for the AFL 2017 CBA, 28% of the AFL is money goes to us seems low. Yeah. Okay. What do you reckon the International Olympic Committee's percentages are?

Ed: [00:07:41] This is good. It's five. 

Bryce: [00:07:44] Yeah, I was going to say eight. 

Alec: [00:07:46] You're both too high. No, zero. So the International Olympic Committee doesn't give money to athletes. The International Olympic Committee even have on their website. What do you win if you win a medal? 

Bryce: [00:07:57] Nothing.

Alec: [00:07:58] A medal? Yeah, the medals. I think if you're in the final and you're at the top eight, you get something like. 

Bryce: [00:08:05] Some prize money. 

Alec: [00:08:07] No, no, no, no, no.

Ed: [00:08:09] The key is to be from a country where you bring great honour. 

Alec: [00:08:13] Well, we will get, we will get that because the answer to the question is winning money in the Olympic gold, not from the Olympics themselves. So the answer is no. So then it's like, all right, well, how do Olympic athletes actually make money? So there are three key ways. Now. The first one is stipends. So from your home country, The second one is prize money. Now, your home country might pay you to win gold. Not every country. And we'll go through some of the diet. And then the third one is sponsorship. Um, so let's start with stipends. This is where, you know, if Bryce was a cyclist for Track Cycling Australia that is the organisation. 

Bryce: [00:08:55] Sounds for sounds right. 

Alec: [00:08:56] Yeah. Sounds right. They would pay him some money now numbers out of the US. Let's say you're a top level USA Team USA sprinter carrying the pride of America on your back as you go to the Olympics, what do you reckon you're getting as a stipend?

Bryce: [00:09:13] So sorry, this is just while you're at the Olympics. Is that. 

Alec: [00:09:16] No, no, no. So this would be like three? Yeah. This is like your income. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Bryce: [00:09:19] They're just all right. So it's like sprinting America, Sprint is America United or whatever is pays the top 20 sprinters as a salary? 

Alec: [00:09:27] Yeah, yeah. 

Bryce: [00:09:28] It's I'm going to say like 90,000 a year. 

Ed: [00:09:31] There's like $50,000. 

Alec: [00:09:32] A thousand dollars a month or so. 

Bryce: [00:09:38] And that's a top.

Alec: [00:09:39] For the top. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well Olympic wrestlers in the US, this is these numbers are all from USA Today the top ranked wrestler $1,000 a month. Second $600 a month. Third $300 a month. 

Bryce: [00:09:53] Oh, my God. These people are doing it for the love of God.

Alec: [00:09:55] Yeah, Yeah. You know, for your.

Bryce: [00:09:57] Or you have a second Job. 

Alec: [00:09:58] Well, whoa. Yeah. So, like, you know, if you're a tennis. 

Ed: [00:10:03] Michael Johnson, when he was winning the 400 and the 200 bolt upright was also like working at CommBank. 

Alec: [00:10:12] Well, the thing that I. Well, when I was working at Kohl's. 

Ed: [00:10:17] Here we go. I'll take your face on.

Alec: [00:10:23] The Australian high Jumper brand and stuff.

Ed: [00:10:26] Yeah. Hey Ben Mitchell starts brother. 

Alec: [00:10:28] Are they actually brothers? Oh, okay. Though I just remember this like all stuff email going around being like, he's just won like the world championships or something. And I was like, well,. 

Ed: [00:10:39] And what did he do at Kohl's? 

Alec: [00:10:42] He worked in a store. Wow. Yeah. Yeah.

Bryce: [00:10:45] There you go. Yeah. 

Ed: [00:10:50] But that's it. That is exciting. So yeah, so he would have been handling boxes of Weet-Bix that had his brother's face on them. 

Bryce: [00:11:00] Yeah. How many do you do? Yeah.

Ed: [00:11:01] Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:11:03] It gets so bad that Home Depot in the US actually had a program to offer Olympians part time jobs. Wholly. Yeah. Yeah, they stopped it. Don't know why. Probably. Maybe not. Great workers injuries? I don't know. 

Ed: [00:11:15] It's just too many people doing knee lifting. Tuscan hot spots of.

Alec: [00:11:22] Yeah, but even that program only paid the Olympians $25,000 a year.

Ed: [00:11:26] This is so grim.This is so grim. 

Alec: [00:11:30] So you're not in and girl skills. 

Ed: [00:11:33] Sometimes you can be one, but competing in the other. 

Alec: [00:11:39] So let's bring it home to Australia. So stipends are not really getting the job done. The Australian Institute of Sport offers tested grants of up to $17,500 for those deemed to have the potential to earn medals. And a further 8000 can be awarded to fund, quote, international or domestic travel for training or competition. Medical sports. If you got cash yourself? 

Ed: [00:12:05] Yeah. All that is at the moment. Like when the Prince of Monaco would enter himself in the slalom in the Winter Olympics. Yeah. Yeah. Have you seen that footage? 

Alec: [00:12:17] I haven't. 

Ed: [00:12:18] Unbelievable footage. Even the commentators, like, got Here he comes with the Prince of Monaco. God sake. You know, he's awful. It's so funny, though. I respect that some. 

Alec: [00:12:32] Royal families don't have enough fun. It's not satisfactory. I would love to see Prince William just be. I'm running 100 metres from this operation, so even that adds those two up. 17,500 8,000. Again. 25 grand. Yeah. You're not getting a lot of money from your home country. Maybe even if you're like a top. 

Audio Clip: [00:12:54] . There are competitions leading up to the Olympics that provide payouts, but it's not a lot of money either. The USA Track and Field Foundation says only about five track and field athletes make $15,000 or more from the sport.

Alec: [00:13:08] So then the question is the prize money in your sport? Now, this is where your home country will pay you if you win. This is your incentive. Now not every country does it. Classic. Let's name and shame. Australia and now Australia. They started. Yeah, we started doing it. Great Britain. Yeah,Norway, Sweden and New Zealand. According to Forbes, they're the only four countries that don't have the only four. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Bryce: [00:13:37] They're generally pretty successful. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:13:39] They punch above their weight. Yeah. Yeah. The Winter Olympics. No, I'd go broke because they win. They think because they only win. They only win. I think that went out in the early 1900s. It's still a lot of fun. Yeah, I love it. Nervous? You get what I say. Things like that. I'm someone who works in public broadcasting for the next five - 15 years. These are things I'm willing to say. Yeah, I say, Why do you get nervous? 

Alec: [00:14:09] When is there another dumb button here? You know.

Ed: [00:14:11] I don't use it. 

Alec: [00:14:15] Bryce and I used it for six years without being cancelled. 

Ed: [00:14:17] You just said that you ended up selling more tickets. Look at Louis C.K. He's selling out Madison Square Garden. twice. So. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:14:24] Four countries don't provide monetary incentives for athletes winning an Olympic medal. Most others do. Important to keep in mind that some countries can put a big prize out there knowing that no one's going to get it. The question for both of you. Which country would you most want to be a gold medallist from? Like who's offering the most cash? 

Ed: [00:14:44] I am so excited to these kids. It's all about pride. And it's all about we showed them and it's all about, you know, we beat the Great Satan America, and we beat the little Satan England while we did it. So am I. Am I on the right track? I would say Iran. 

Alec: [00:15:02] You can say Iran. Yeah. A lot of oil money.

Ed: [00:15:04] Yeah. I mean, say if you managed to beat the Great Satan and the little Satan in an event and you're Iranian, it is going to be good times forever.

Bryce: [00:15:12] Yeah. Okay, that makes sense. 

Alec: [00:15:13] What are you thinking, Bryce? 

Bryce: [00:15:14] I'm thinking of it closer to home. I'm going to go to Canada. 

Ed: [00:15:19] Nice. Nice, man. I'm giving you anything.

Alec: [00:15:23] Okay. What's your, um. What's your logic?

Bryce: [00:15:27] The similar vibe next door neighbours to the US. Like, let's get it done.

Ed: [00:15:34] That's interesting. 

Bryce: [00:15:36] We want to be the big guys in North America. 

Alec: [00:15:39] Okay. All right. All right. So while you've been I've got Canada and I've just found Iran. Come on, Canada. $22,000 for a gold medal. 

Bryce: [00:15:49] That's pretty decent. I guess it's almost an entire year salary.

Alec: [00:15:53] $23,000. Yeah. Compared to the stipends. Yeah, yeah, yeah. True. Double your salary on $125,000.

Ed: [00:16:02] Now, there's a joint. This gives you a million and a house. It's not Saudi Arabia. Where is it going to go? This is going to be. 

Alec: [00:16:08] No, I think the Philippines gave a house. That was it. But. But that's not the answer, at least according to Singapore. Damn it. So I should have got that. 998,000 USD. Oh, sorry. No. Convert it to AUD. 

Ed: [00:16:24] Any sport? 

Bryce: [00:16:27] A million. 

Alec: [00:16:27] A million. 

Bryce: [00:16:28] And what? Has that ever been paid?

Ed: [00:16:30] No, I think they get to do one of the few I think may be table tennis front with a convert. Maybe at some point I think. I can't remember though. 

Alec: [00:16:37] Now this was my follow up question. How many Olympic golds has Singapore won throughout time? I think this might be just Summer Olympics, but I don't know if Singapore is exactly putting on points in the Winter Olympics. 

Bryce: [00:16:52] Yeah, What do they figure? 

Ed: [00:16:53] Like, I'm going to go. I'm going to yes, I'm going to say, Now, hang on. Hang on a second. You want me to say table tennis? But you don't know. 

Bryce: [00:17:04] The prize is big enough. I know.

Alec: [00:17:05] The answer. ED, is really.

Ed: [00:17:11] Either table tennis or taekwondo. 

Alec: [00:17:15] You can have both of them, but neither of them would be right. They've won one gold medal in 2016 in the hundred metre butterfly. Shout out Joseph Schooling. 

Bryce: [00:17:28] And he's got a million bucks. 

Alec: [00:17:29] Yeah I guess so. 

Ed: [00:17:32] and so it runs pretty good. 225 Yeah, it was pretty close. 

Alec: [00:17:35] Some of the other high ranking ones. Kazakhstan 338,000 AUD. Oh, now, to be honest, I don't know if any of those have won gold. this is what they put on the table. That's pretty good. Malaysia $320,000. 

Ed: [00:17:51] Yeah. Good. Yep. Yep. Fair enough.

Alec: [00:17:53] Italy. Italy, $280,000. 

Ed: [00:17:56] Malaysia would want a badminton one. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:17:58] And then rounding out the top five, the Philippines. 271 Thousand. Italy. Yeah, Italy, 288 Thoudan. 

Ed: [00:18:04] That's a lot more than last time they did. Did they win a bunch of athletics? I didn't think they were going to win. Like the 404 man in the 200. They got a lot more than they thought they were going to get. Yeah, Yeah. 

Alec: [00:18:13] You broke the bank. That's why they got a debt crisis. 

Bryce: [00:18:16] Is there unity for really good athletes to become citizens of Singapore? 

Ed: [00:18:21] So my mom's job. 

Alec: [00:18:22] great question. 

Ed: [00:18:23] Well, well, they don't like to hand those out, though. 

Bryce: [00:18:25] That's the trick. Yeah. 

Ed: [00:18:27] So they're like, What is it? Switzerland? It's like, you can be here, but this is your passport. So yeah, my mum's job when she was for the Sydney 2000 Olympics, she worked for the Immigration Department and one of her jobs was to help fast track the visas for sports in that we were not good at and we needed to make up the numbers. So she's retired now, so they kind of get up and it was government sanctioned, so they can't get over that. ADA Yeah, yeah. So that was part of her work to get through badminton and stuff like that to fast track their visas. 

Alec: [00:18:56] You know, I have no problem with that. 

Bryce: [00:18:58] Why does Australia care though, about that.

Alec: [00:19:01] National pride?

Bryce: [00:19:01] Is it? Just that.

Ed: [00:19:02] Yeah,. 

Alec: [00:19:03] I don't know.

Bryce: [00:19:03] Because there's money in it for the Olympic body. But is there money in US for winning badminton? No. Australia? No. So it's just like, wait, we.

Alec: [00:19:10] Like a government deposit. Well like where there's a minister for sports, like it's a national priority to win stuff. Yeah. 

Bryce: [00:19:19] When you cluster screen priority. 

Alec: [00:19:22] Well we haven't spoken about Australia obviously. But that is a perfect segway for context. We've given a number of countries, but let's give the US context. 50,000 Aussie for gold, 30,000 Aussie for silver, 20,000 Aussie for bronze America in a very American way. EntItle this Operation Gold. So with all that context in mind, what do you think Australia put on the table for the Tokyo Olympics? Gold, silver and bronze. If you want to guess. 

Ed: [00:19:58] It was 50, 20, 10 grand.

Bryce: [00:20:02] Back in 2010. 180, 100, 50,. 

Alec: [00:20:09] I like Bryce sports minister because they're the numbers I want to say but they aren't the numbers that we saw. 20,000 for gold, 15 for silver, ten for bronze. 

Ed: [00:20:17] So in my head it was 20 for gold. And I bumped it up because I thought, You 're going to say no? And I remember reading that. I think I spoke about it on the radio saying because my father in law coached Lauren Burns to Australia's only ever gold medal in taekwondo at Darling Harbour, not far from where we're recording. And he got bugger all and she got my girl man. So my personal experience is she got nothing, but she's very smart and she's turned that into a long career in coaching, mental coaching, you know, nutrition, but that's through her own study. Especially the gold medal. I want a gold medal. But she's done so much work after that to keep it going. The one thing my father, my father in law does still have is all the really good Nike tracksuits from the Sydney 2000. 

Bryce: [00:21:07] Worth a lot. 

Ed: [00:21:08] Yeah. And I know that the other day he was wearing one. We're in Bali and he was wearing one of the bum bags just down the street and said, That's a collector's item. You take it off. Yeah. Yeah. He said, No. 

Bryce: [00:21:19] So there's money in that. 

Alec: [00:21:19] Yeah. So there is a caveat though, and I want to get to that because this is a stitch up of a caveat, but just for context, 20,000, 15,000, 10,000. Emma McEwen would have left Tokyo with $110,000 worth of metal around. 

Bryce: [00:21:34] Serious outlaw either. 

Alec: [00:21:35] Serious outlaw. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of athletes sort of left with nothing. Less interesting fact. 

Ed: [00:21:41] So did she, did she get all that or did that go, Sorry, mate, it's if you are a gold medallist.

Alec: [00:21:46] Oh I'm pretty sure you can. 

Ed: [00:21:48] Does that disadvantage people? Yeah. That's what we think of the per medal. Is Michael Phelps a better Olympian than Carl Lewis? Because you go, Well, hang on a sec. Look, Michael Phelps, have more. That's that out there. 150 running events this week. That's always the debate, isn't it? You know, there's only one marathon, but there's eight swimming events.

Alec: [00:22:05] No, no, I'm pretty sure it's permanent. 

Ed: [00:22:06] Wow. Okay. That's alright. 

Alec: [00:22:08] But if we're wrong, I'll come to join us next time. So here's the Asterix and what I reckon is a stitch. Up enticing before. If you retire after the Olympics. People who love the Australian Olympic Committee don't pay you to do what? Oh, if you win. If you win gold, and then you're like, All right, I'm good. I'm going. 

Bryce: [00:22:33] Immediately. 

Alec: [00:22:33] After. Well, it's just like. It's like this. You lose. Yeah. If you're not going to the next Olympics or you don't get paid, that's horrific. 

Bryce: [00:22:40] So. Yeah, but like, how long do they wait before? Do you have to pay it back? How did they wait?

Alec: [00:22:45] You know, I'm not so I'm not sure. In justifying their position. They said medal incentive funding is an annual athlete incentive scheme, not a reward program. So if you stop competing at the top level, you don't receive the payment. It's not for what you did, it's to keep it going for the next one.

Ed: [00:23:06] And that is what it is. 

Alec: [00:23:11] It's like. And so that's not every.

Ed: [00:23:14] They have solved the biggest problem in sporting contracts, which is that you are almost always paying for past performance. So whenever teams in the salary cap, NBA, NRL, NFL, whenever they get in trouble, even in soccer my one great love the major issue that we always have or they always have currently on the team is that you are almost always paying for past performance in the big contracts you give. Yeah. 

Bryce: [00:23:40] So they saw no indication of future performance. 

Ed: [00:23:42] Oh, that's one of your favourites at the start. Yeah. We are not like that. We are liars. Blah, blah blah. I always skip that bit. 

Alec: [00:23:55] Now not every country kills the fun like Australia. Most countries will just reward the athletes for winning. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But not Australia. 

Ed: [00:24:03] As stiff as going back to Singapore having a medal and they, like, won't get back in the pool. So. 

Alec: [00:24:08] Equity Mates before we get to the final answer of is there money in Olympic gold? We need to interrupt and take a quick break so we can keep answering yes to is there money in podcasting? Now, we don't often speak kindly about Gina Rinehart on this program. Aha. But there are private benefactors that also really go. Now, the amount that Gina offered Australian swimmers was not published. No one knows except for Emma McCain. But Gina gave medal bonuses to Australian swimmers at Tokyo and her bonus was not dependent on whether they stuck with the sport. So full credit, Gina. 

Ed: [00:24:51] And then who was it where they knew and when they bagged the netball? Yeah. And then she said what she was always going to say which was. Well then I'll keep my money and netball. Some of them were surprised. And the answer to that is have you not seen how she treats her own children. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah.

Bryce: [00:25:10] So. So she got 10,000.

Alec: [00:25:11] Yeah. And now I've got to go. 

Ed: [00:25:15] Oh so sorry. It was undisclosed.

Alec: [00:25:17] I wasn't even listening to Bryce. Was nothing here. I reckon it was more than 10,000. Yeah. She can afford it. Yeah. Yeah. She had a lump of iron or a lump of coal and in the market these days that's worth more than 10,000 like me or think. Now, as you know, Gina put a lot of money into Australian swimming and I guess as part of the contract, she got Australian swimmers to do ads for her. 

Audio Clip: [00:25:50] Our patron, Gina Rinehart, helps to give me the leadership and inspiration.

Audio Clip: [00:25:55] To want to be the best.

Alec: [00:25:57] El patron, Gina Rinehart. That which gives me the inspiration to be my best. 

Ed: [00:26:01] And what's interesting about the second voice is that it was Cody Simpson, of course. Yeah, yeah. Miley Cyrus, his ex, who was already a very famous pop star when he was a kid. Yeah. And so they've gone and said, Mate, you're the biggest name yet. You're going to need to do this. And that says something about his economic position that he's going, Yeah, no worries. Hmm. That's almost that's almost as well. Is there any money in music? Slashes their money in money in marrying Miley Cyrus question because that's a fascinating situation. 

Alec: [00:26:27] Or Cody just wants to be known as a swimmer. So he just says yes to everything. 

Ed: [00:26:30] Well, he was just you're right, because the shot was him in the pool, which was unnecessary. Yeah. Yeah. But that is interesting. 

Alec: [00:26:38] There's so little money in swimming that Cody had to go become an international pop star before he could pursue a single man. So Gina Rinehart was giving money to swimmers, but the IOC and the IOC was putting money up. But if we do the maths, you win gold, you might get 20,000 from the Australian Olympic Committee. Add that to a 20- $25,000 stipend that you might be getting. If you're a top athlete, you're still.

Bryce: [00:27:06] You're not. 

Alec: [00:27:07] You're not you're probably you're probably just at a living wage at this point. Yeah. Yeah. But that doesn't include your cost of coaching and yeah, medical treatment, all that stuff. So then the first two buckets, stipend and prize money, that leads us to the third bucket, which is a good bucket if you can get it. Endorsement deal.

Ed: [00:27:28] Oh, here we go.

Alec: [00:27:29] So I'm going to start with another question. Who is the highest earning gold medallist of all time. 

Ed: [00:27:35] Sponsorships?

Alec: [00:27:36] Just this is just just cash is just anything. Anything. 

Ed: [00:27:39] Oh, do you mean any any country,. 

Alec: [00:27:41] Any country, any way of making money who's got a gold medallist and the most money in the bank. 

Ed: [00:27:47] You're doing this in the You're doing, Usain Bolt or very poor. We all figure, am I going to go with I'm going to go old school, going to a Bruce Jenner seasonally adjusted. in today's money. Yeah, I'm going to go Bruce Jenner using today's money back then. 

Alec: [00:28:05] Sorry I actually don't mind Olympic gold medallist. I just mean the wealthiest Olympian. 

Ed: [00:28:10] Or the wealthiest person to ever play to ever be at the Olympics. Independently wealthy of being at the Olympics. Tiger Woods. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:28:17] No. Oh, Tiger Woods. He's not even top five, apparently. 

Bryce: [00:28:21] Whoa, Jordan, I don't think Tiger's played Olympics or golf is pretty recent.

Ed: [00:28:26] Okay, So Jordan J. 

Alec: [00:28:27] Ordan is number two, $1.7 billion. 

Ed: [00:28:30] Someone's richer than Jordan. Yeah, that's been at the Olympics. Yeah. Oh.

Bryce: [00:28:41] They're going to be.

Alec: [00:28:42] Like that's that's saying I know this game. Yeah. You're going to say some someone. 

Bryce: [00:28:47] At the Monaco.

Alec: [00:28:50] He's not on the list unfortunately. That's Monaco's money. I'll give you a hint. Twins.

Bryce: [00:28:56] Twins. 

Ed: [00:28:56] Are the Winklevoss twins. That's like one of those shit hits. Road Spot. Yeah. Good job. I love when they come up. 

Alec: [00:29:07] Now. Sponsorship for most athletes is really. It's a good name for. Yeah, it's really the name of the game. One Olympics, Octagon Olympics, which is some sports management network there. Managing director said, "The only source of income for most Olympic athletes is through sponsorship." This is the name of the game. And if you're big, it works. Speedo paid Michael Phelps $1,000,000 for winning eight gold medals in 2008. 

Ed: [00:29:37] That's what they challenged him to see if he could do it. It was a bet. 

Alec: [00:29:40] actually feel like $1,000,000 for a gold medal. Isn't that good? Yeah, That's like being honest. Yes.

Bryce: [00:29:44] For numbers. 

Alec: [00:29:45] Yes. No. 

Ed: [00:29:47] Imagine if he jumped ship. If he jumped ship. I couldn't believe. 

Alec: [00:29:54] Ryan Lochte earned more than 2 million from endorsements in 2012. Hot inflation between 2008 and 2012. You can say. I think most swimmers are pretty hot. Yeah. Yeah. Katie All right, that's all right. Katie Ledecky Yeah. $7 million from are still Wait till we beat up. Well, I think she still got the sponsorship money, so, like, there's serious money on the table if you're at the top of the game. The most people on and so there's this rule in Olympic circles and in sports management circles. The 48 hour period after Olympic gold is like make or break. Because when you win, you're splashed over the edge of the papers everywhere. But then very quickly goes, Yeah, no one remembers you. And so literally, like, sports agents have plans if the athletes win gold on the pay they're going to do how they're going to like break out of the sports niche and get into the mainstream. 

Ed: [00:31:05] Because then you end up with the odd ones like that stubble, the cook guy that won the breaststroke or the butterfly out of nowhere. So you go.

Bryce: [00:31:10] Yeah, exactly. But 

Ed: [00:31:11] I remember talking to him on the radio and we were pumping up what sponsorships are you going to get? And he's trying to work that. Oh, we're going to get to that now because you like it's a surprise. So you've gone from it's like being a one hit wonder. You've gone from nowhere to having a number one single. You better cash.

Bryce: [00:31:26] But you fast back to where. 

Ed: [00:31:28] You fast back to nowhere. 

Alec: [00:31:29] So there's this I came across this story of Kelly clock to either of you remember her she won gold at Salt Lake City in 2002. The snowboarding halfpipe. So Australian? No American. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She deferred her freshman year of college to do it. And then when she hit this crucial 48 hour period where which quote can make or break how much America remembers an athlete before viewers begin adoring the next gold medallist. And so she did a PR tour where she sat down with David Letterman and Jay Leno. She attended the Daytona 500 and then did some PR stuff with Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake, I guess, when those two were still together. But it's like the PR machine has to go into overdrive to lock in. Yeah, See, that's what I mean. 

Ed: [00:32:18] But that's the problem with Australia, is that you come back here and you go, Oh, have you met coffee? You know, I guess, yeah. Like you know what I mean. Like there's not the scale, as you guys would say. Wow. Okay, 48 hours. That's really good. 

Bryce: [00:32:35] But like, why are they like, Yeah, you're like, it just doesn't make good sense to my eyes for the brand to do. That's like, yeah, you're hot now that like literally And I see what you mean. 

Ed: [00:32:43] Basically it's like when they do the, the ads at the start of the season for cricket and last year and this year and then last year they got to the point where none of those people were in the test team by the fifth test. So all the people in the ad had been dropped injured. And so it was like, you can't even shoot it three months. Yeah, Yeah. Well, it's very rare. 

Alec: [00:33:02] For most athletes. Sponsorship isn't the name of the game. So then the question is, what's an athlete to do?

Ed: [00:33:09] B, be hot on Instagram? Well, I follow a couple of Swedish runners. Yeah, and jeez, those. 

Bryce: [00:33:16] Voters, high jump.

Ed: [00:33:17] People. It's my area. They are selling stuff and good on them. I'm good. But every fourth post is them in the gear saying off to compete. You're like, Oh yeah, that's right. That way I get around the are you following bikini model thing You know they're athletes it's a it's a for everybody. 

Audio Clip: [00:33:41] Many athletes do work in only a fraction of the athletes really are able to make a living from the endorsements. 

Audio Clip: [00:33:50] Troops work full time and they get a little money from co-worker donations and Lithuania paid for her travel to Beijing, but it was still tight. 

Alec: [00:33:57] So I think that just gives. Since she was asking her co-workers for donations. The country paid for her flights and she was working for them.

Ed: [00:34:04] Yeah, that's it. That's the whole story of most athletes is in that little grab. Yeah. 

Alec: [00:34:11] So then it turns to donations. You've got it. You've got to ask people for money to go in for the 2016 Olympics. Thousands of donors donated $750,000 in total to help fund the trips of more than 140 Olympic athletes from around the world.

Ed: [00:34:31] Holy moly. Yeah. To the Olympics. 

Alec: [00:34:33] To go to the Olympics.

Audio Clip: [00:34:34] Many athletes have turned to crowdsourcing to supplement their incomes. Monica started one to fund her way to Tokyo. It's now up to $30,000. Aaron's Go Fund Me help finance his way to the Olympic track and field trials in July. 

Audio Clip: [00:34:48] In a matter of 22 hours. 

Alec: [00:34:50] The final option is get a wealthy benefactor. There was that Steve Carell movie where he was like the wrestling coach. Remember that? But apparently now this is reportedly Gina Rinehart sponsored the top 50 competitors at the most recent Olympics for Australia. Apparently reportedly paid them $525 a week. Including, you know, some of the best rowers. 

Ed: [00:35:16] Which is what you get for Max. that's about the same as what you get to go on Mafs or Big Brother?

Alec: [00:35:21] Both hard work, to be honest. Now, that was according to Fox Sports that Gina occupied them that much. 

Ed: [00:35:30] So I would think that she would. Okay, so let's all think let's try and get into Gina's mind. Right. Would Gina want that figure to be high or would she want that figure to be low? Keeping in mind all that, she wants his people to like her and get good press? 

Alec: [00:35:42] Oh, she wants people to think she saved sports. 

Ed: [00:35:44] So do you think that whoever leaked that on from her side, do you think they would? You know what I mean. That Don't you want it? Do you want it to be. Well, she gave me 500 grand. Or do you think that makes people go? Why don't you grant five grand to charity? Like what do you think? 

Bryce: [00:35:59] She wants it to be comfortably high. 

Ed: [00:36:01] So. 525 What does that do to you guys when you hear 525. 

Alec: [00:36:05] I could live off that.

Ed: [00:36:06] See, I feel like it's reasonable to think she's nailed it. Yeah. Yeah. PR people. Yeah. Nailed 525. Yeah.

Alec: [00:36:11] It's not like that's what I mean. 

Bryce: [00:36:12] It's not gross where it's like. What the hell yeah. Not on the other side? It's like, that's just you just trying to do it for the. 

Alec: [00:36:23] Now that for me, what it makes me think is, wow, these athletes must have a lot of money that they need, like a regular wage. So she's hit the Yeah she's now actually now that Yeah. Full credit Gina didn't think I would be pumping you out this one but I think.

Bryce: [00:36:38] You said only 50. 

Alec: [00:36:39] Top 50 competitors. 

Ed: [00:36:40] Yeah the 51st is rough. 

Alec: [00:36:47] it's actually more valuable to be to go from 51 to 50 than it is to go from second to first.

Bryce: [00:36:53] That's fantastic. Yeah, you're right. 

Ed: [00:36:55] And how they would be pitching going on. Yeah. You would have to have. 

Alec: [00:37:00] How do you differentiate between sports? 

Bryce: [00:37:02] Loving the swimmers. 

Alec: [00:37:10] There's honestly a real role for a celebrity or a business person to become a benefactor for really niche sports. 

Ed: [00:37:19] That is publicity. You're absolutely right. Yeah. Yeah. So I should tell Hughesy Hughesy to sponsor the air pistol. 

Alec: [00:37:26] Yeah. Or the lawn balls. Like classic example. Yeah. It's a sport that he's. He could play it. 

Ed: [00:37:30] Yeah, you're right. Yeah. He's a good runner so he could do like middle to long distance the walkers. That's it. Okay. That's Yeah. 

Alec: [00:37:38] When they a lot of money walking. 

Audio Clip: [00:37:41] A recent global study of 500 elite athletes found that nearly 60% did not consider themselves financially stable. We're not sponsored athletes on cereal boxes and Gatorade bottles. I started driving for DoorDash. 

Audio Clip: [00:37:55] I worked at Panera, a bank. The financial strain is huge.

Audio Clip: [00:37:59] That's because unless they win a medal, Olympians don't get paid for competing at the games. 

Alec: [00:38:05] Let's wrap this all up. Is there money in Olympic gold? Unless you're from Singapore? Probably, no.

Ed: [00:38:13] No, This is amazing because I would argue over the journey. Whoever has paid to be in the Usain bolt business has not got value. I don't think he's as ubiquitous. And like Puma, for example, I have never bought anything Puma because of Usain Bolt. I'm sure he's got a million other deals. What do you guys think? I think over the journey, they've he has been overpaid for that. 

Bryce: [00:38:35] Yeah, I think he did incredibly well for the short period of time he was around. No one really keeps track. He does keep popping up every now and then. Now there's rumours that he's lost like millions of dollars spent stolen from him or something. 

Alec: [00:38:47] Well, let's not forget that he played a trial game for the Central Coast Mariners two years ago. I went on their website to buy his jersey bolt 95 on. This is going to be a collector's item. And they hadn't even worked out a metric that they were going to have those jerseys ready to go. 

Bryce: [00:39:10] Well, before I answer the question, is there money Ren? Is there actual money in the metal itself? 

Alec: [00:39:15] Or how much gold. 

Bryce: [00:39:17] Is it? A gold medal? 

Ed: [00:39:19] Gold plated. Now, what if I'm buying them on eBay? Because they do come up occasionally when people are hot, when people fall on hard times. You can buy people's gold medals. So people will sometimes sell the gold Medal if they're having trouble. In fact, it's. 

Bryce: [00:39:33] Because they don't get paid. 

Ed: [00:39:35] That's right. So you can actually like Oscars and something like that. 

Alec: [00:39:38] In a gold medal. There are six grams of gold and 550 grams of silver. So it's essentially a silver medal still. So when you lose the silver, according to Yahoo Finance, if you were going to just sell the medals based on the value of the material, £646 for a gold medal, £372 for a silver medal, £30 for a bronze medal, nothing got a bronze. So it is a market share. So here are some stats about it from the Olympic athletes themselves of a survey of 500 Olympic athletes. 60% did not consider themselves financially stable. And this the stats from 2012. My gosh, in 2012. So an Olympic year, half of the U.S. track and field Olympic team made less than $15,000 from the sport, inclusive of stipends from the sport prize money, and not just from the Olympics, but prize money throughout the year and sponsorships. Now, for context, the CEO of USA Track and Field makes over $1,000,000 a year . 

Ed: [00:40:52] There is always the right. And that's always. I had a friend of mine who was dating an Olympic swimmer once and she said that his way that he made money is that after the Olympics and after the meets, they've got a series of privately funded skins, whatever they're called, around Europe. And he would go and swim in those and make a bit of money, but never enough. And I always remember that. Yeah, that was fascinating.

Alec: [00:41:18] And to leave you with one more stat that just shows the disparity between mainstream sports and Olympic sports, for want of a better term, in 2013, Michael Jordan made $90 million, which was more than all of the athletes in Sochi 2014 combined. 

Ed: [00:41:39] Way to sum it up. Right. 

Bryce: [00:41:42] Sorry. There's no money. Yeah. Wow. I thought there would have been more. 

Ed: [00:41:47] I'm shocked by these figures. Now we've reached the end of our first tranche. Is there any money in it? Let us know. This is your social people's job. What other. What are the things you want us to investigate? Is there any money in. Let us know what topic you'd like us to investigate and we will be back with another series shortly. 

Bryce: [00:42:10] Love it. 

Alec: [00:42:10] Perfect. 

Bryce: [00:42:11] Love it. Had a lot of fun. 

Alec: [00:42:12] Yeah.  

Ed: [00:42:13] Thank you both. And I'd just like to say a big thank you to my sponsor, Gina Rinehart. The way you extract that or what, it jumps out of the ground into your pockets because it's so excited to be there.