Map Reveals Where USA's 2018 Olympic Team Members Are From
The 2018 Winter Olympic Games are in full swing and supporters across the U.S. are rooting for hometown heroes representing their country in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
For anyone unsure of whether any Olympians hail from their region, USA Today has compiled a map revealing where each of the athletes live.
According to Team USA, the team consists of 135 men and 109 women. This year’s group of 244 athletes marks the largest American team in the history of the winter games.
As the interactive map reveals, certain areas of the country are more likely to produce winter Olympians. Naturally, most of these regions share traits such as a consistently cold winter.
Colorado, home to some of the most celebrated ski slopes in the world, is also home to the most competitors of the 31 states represented. With 31 Olympians from the Centennial State, it stands well in front of its nearest competitor, California, which sent 22 athletes.
Minnesota, New York and Utah round out the top five with 20, 19 and 16 competitors at the games, respectively.
In terms of a representation of a state’s overall population, Vermont stands out as the clear leader, according to CBS.
More than 2 in every 100,000 residents of the state are competing this year in the Olympic games, by far the highest per-capita rate. Vermont was followed by Alaska, which sent nine athletes.
Vermont, which sent 15 competitors, ranks sixth overall among the 50 states.
Nearly one in three states, mostly in warmer regions along the South and Southwest, are not represented at all on the Olympic team.
Looking at a more local level, Park City, Utah, holds the distinction of sending more Olympians to the 2018 games than any other city. Eight athletes live in the city, followed on the list by Steamboat Springs, Colorado, which sent six.
Five Olympians each are from Anchorage, Alaska and Duluth, Minnesota.
Zooming out on USA Today’s interactive map reveals a lone U.S. competitor who traveled to Pyeongchang from outside of the country. Long-track speedskater Carlijn Schoutens, 23, was born in Trenton, New Jersey, but lives in Heemstede, Netherlands.
Additional details can be seen by filtering the results by Olympic discipline. While more athletes are from Colorado, it is clear that the skiing and snowboarding mecca is not the preferred locale for all sports.
Among figure skaters competing for Team USA, for example, none live in Colorado.
There were American 14 figure skaters selected to compete in the 2018 games, Business Insider reported. The majority live in either California or Michigan.
Across all disciplines, more than 75 percent of U.S. Olympians have attended college. A total of 87 schools can claim an athlete representing America in South Korea.
More than one in three of the Team USA athletes with a college background competed in their sport on a collegiate level. At least 48 schools included future 2018 Winter Olympians on their squad at some point, generally in disciplines including hockey, bobsledding and cross-country skiing.
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