Olympic Medal Tally 2012: Most Surprising Nations to Earn Multiple Golds

The medal tally at the 2012 London Olympics shows the United States and China are dominating, but a few surprising countries have put an athlete on the tallest podium multiple times already.

China and the U.S. have 18 gold medals apiece, and a full medal count can be found at London2012.com. But this was to be expected, as these two sporting giants have massive teams and compete in nearly every event.

But the smaller nations have only a few athletes capable of medaling, making it remarkable when they are able to earn gold more than once. 

Here are the most surprising nations to have multiple athletes win events.

North Korea

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea may not be democratic or a republic, but it has earned four gold medals in London.

The country often makes headlines for its secretive government, but this summer, its weightlifters have stolen the show.

Om Yun Choi and Kim Un Guk both set Olympic records to win gold, while Rim Jong Sim won in women’s weightlifting.

Their fourth gold came from An Kum Ae, who fought her way to the top of the 115-pound women’s judo competition. 

Hungary

Hungary has the smallest population of any country to win at least two gold medals.

The tiny landlocked European nation has produced exactly two gold medalists thus far.

Aron Szilagyi was the class of the men’s individual sabre competition while no one in history has ever swam the 200-meter breaststroke faster than Daniel Gyurta. 

This has been a fine Olympics already for the Hungarian delegation.

Kazakhstan

While most American’s have had very little exposure to Kazakhstan outside of Borat, the Kazakhs are starting to make winning gold medals a habit.

The country has three medals at this Olympics, and they are all gold. Cyclist Alexandr Vinokurov made sure his compatriots did not have to wait long to start celebrating and won a gold medal on the morning of the first full day of competition.

After that, the women’s weightlifters continued the trend. Maiya Maneza and Zulfiya Chinshanlo both won their respective weight classes and set Olympic records. 

For a country not expected to make much of a splash in London, Kazakhstan has already won a surprising amount of events.