The Best Names of the Olympics

The 2016 Summer Olympics are complete and etched into our memories. The Olympics represent all that is good about sports. Yes, there are some controversies, but, in the end, all the good outweighs the bad.

One of the things we do is record all the medal winners at the Olympics, and, in that process, we discover so many wonderful names that come from all around the world. Here are my favorite names among all the medal winners in 2016.

* Virginia Thrasher of the U.S. won a gold medal in Shooting: Women's 10m air rifle – what a perfect name for a champion

* Joseph Schooling of Singapore won a gold medal in Swimming: Men's 100m Butterfly – he schooled Michael Phelps

* Faith Chepngetich Kipyegon of Kenya won a gold medal in Athletics: Women's 1500 – you gotta have faith!

* Migran Arutyunyan of Armenia won a silver medal in Wrestling: Men's Greco-Roman 66kg – he certainly dished out his share of migraines

* Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce of Jamaica won a bronze medal in Athletics: Women's 100m – and a medal for the most hyphens in her name

The musical names of the Chinese are so cool:

* Song Yu of China won a bronze medal in Judo: Women + 78kg

* Jinjie Gong & Tianshi Zhong of China won a silver medal in Trampoline: Men's event

* Jingli Duan of China won a bronze medal in Rowing: Women's Single Sculls – not to mention her name sounds the same as mine!

* Ning Ding of China won a gold medal in Table Tennis: Women's Singles

* Cancan Ren of China won a bronze medal in Boxing: Women’s Flyweight

And the best of the musical names:

* Dong Dong of China won a silver medal in Trampoline: Men's event

But the best overall can be none other than:

* Usain Bolt won a gold medal in Athletics: Men’s 100 meter, Athletics: Men’s 200 meter, and Athletics: Men’s 4 x 100 meter relay – are you insane, Usain? You are as fast as a bolt of lighting.

Hats off to Usain and his triple-triple with the same set of three gold medals in the 2008, 2012, and 2016 Olympics. And to the other athletes who won three or more gold medals at the 2016 Olympics:

Michael Phelps, USA, swimming: 5 gold, 1 silver

Katie Ledecky, USA, swimming: 4 gold, 1 silver

Simone Biles, USA, gymnastics: 4 gold, 1 bronze

Katinka Hosszu, HUN, swimming: 3 gold, 1 silver

Jason Kenny, GBR, cycling: 3 gold

Danuta Kozak, HUN, canoe sprint: 3 gold

Ryan Murphy, USA, swimming: 3 gold