USA vs China: sources and method

Select USA and CHN, Olympic Games competition type, Summer editions 1984–2024 from current Olympedia tables. Cross-check all pre-2024 US gold values against the USOPC history book and Paris against Team USA. Check Chinese historical golds against national sports administration and Olympic Committee reports. Preserve revised medal allocations: China 48 in 2008 and 39 in 2012. No cumulative sum, missing-year imputation or partial 2026 result. Native animation interpolates between editions, which are the only observations.

• USOPC: Team USA Summer Olympic History 2024, printed pages 30–31 (PDF page 19)
• Team USA: Paris 2024 medal results and China comparison
• General Administration of Sport of China: 1984–2000 gold totals
• Chinese Olympic Committee: Rio 2016 report (26 golds)
• Chinese Olympic Committee: Tokyo 2020 report (38 golds)
• Olympedia: United States, current Medals by Games table
• Olympedia: China, current Medals by Games table

Tokyo retains edition label 2020, competed in 2021 · 1984 Soviet-led boycott and changing event programmes limit comparison of raw counts · Mainland China NOC CHN only; Hong Kong/Taiwan not added · Motion between editions is interpolation; 1985 etc are not observations · Medal reallocations may change future counts

Background: NASA Earth Observatory image by Michala Garrison, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Existing image, not AI. Image page · NASA media terms. Country flags: public domain via Flagpedia.

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