Men Differences in National Teams Between Countries?

[lilmisssunshine]

Our family is a little odd because we live in America, but only get Japanese TV by satellite. No American TV. We were recently watching the Japanese Olympic qualifiers.

I was surprised to find out that there was a high school kid in the running! When I stopped watching, he was looking to have a pretty good chance at making the Olympic team, but I haven't been able to find any English-language news sites saying whether he made it or not. Would that even be possible here? Are there even any college guys in the running?

Also, my husband was telling me that in Japan, companies pay big bucks to hire Olympic level athletes in a sort of sponsorship deal. But it's not like the US where they'd be paid for commercials. The athletes basically work a regular job for the company (as in desk work in a lot of cases) then wear the company logo at national competitions. Office worker by day, Olympian by night. It made me curious about whether the guys on the US team also have day jobs. Does anyone know?

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Pretty sure that here in the UK all our national team members get bursaries from the National lottery fund

 

[skschlag]

Most of the US guys are with Team Hilton. They support them as the pursue their dream. They have to be out of/ not in college to do that. We do have some college athletes that can/have made the team. Sam Mikulak was still in college when he made the Olympic team. I doubt we have any high schoolers that can compete with the older guys at that level.