Norway has experienced unprecedented success in the field of elite sports over the last 30 years especially in relation to medals in the Olympics, securing 105 gold medals and 268 medals in total over the last 15 Summer and Winter Olympics combined. However, there is a skewed distribution where more than 80% of the medals are achieved in winter sports. Furthermore, the number of medal-winning opportunities due to the increase in the number of disciplines indicates that we should not just look at the absolute level, but also take into consideration the "market share". In addition, one may also look beyond the podium and include top eight results to get a broader picture of the strength in depth at the elite level. Storm and Nielsen (2017) conducted an analysis of the top eight results in World Athletics Championships and Olympic Games between 2008 and 2016. Their findings indicate that Norway's market share in winter sports (the disciplines included in the Olympics), has been relatively stable since 1994 (the share of points in relation to the total of points possible to achieve), however with a downward trend in summer sports. Furthermore, including factors like the population size of the country and wealth - Gross National Product per capita - both factors that influence the capability to compete, they find that Norway underachieved in Olympic summer sports, and overachieved in Olympic winter sports in 2016 (Storm and Nielsen 2017: 371-375).
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