Mone Inami bites her silver medal at the women's golf medal ceremony for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, at the Kasumigaseki Country Club in Saitama Prefecture on Aug. 7, 2021. (Mainichi/Rei Kubo)

       The Mainichi Shimbun answers some common questions readers may have about Olympic athletes biting their medals.

       Question: Nagoya Mayor Takashi Kawamura got in trouble recently for biting a Tokyo Olympic gold medal belonging to a softball player. Why did athletes start biting their medals in the first place?

       Answer: Despite no clear documentation or records, a variety of theories exist, including that athletes were asked how victory tasted, or that they tried to mark the medals as their own with their teeth. An article called "Why Olympic winners bite their medals?" on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) website describes how way back when, traders would bite their gold coins to confirm their authenticity, as gold is soft.

       It also says athletes started biting medals because the "photographers ask them to." In the same piece, David Wallechinsky, president of the International Society of Olympic Historians, explains that photographers ask for the bites because they want iconic shots, not because athletes do it themselves.

       Q: What do photographers want to capture?

       A: If athletes hold their medals close to their faces, photographers can get simultaneous close-ups of medals and the athletes' expressions. Photographers may have asked athletes to pose by biting their medals.

       Q: Are gold medals made of real gold?

       A: The IOC says the last pure-gold medal was for the 1912 Stockholm Games. At the Tokyo Games, medals were made by recycling precious metals found in cell phones and small household appliances. Gold medals are then made of silver and plated with over 6 grams of pure gold.

       Q: Do athletes want to bite their medals?

       A: Naoko Takahashi, women's marathon winner at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, smiled while biting her gold medal. At the Vancouver Olympics in 2010, a German luger chipped a tooth biting his silver medal. But when Akito Watabe won the silver medal in the Nordic skiing combined at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, he refused to bite his medal when asked. Medals should be treated with great care.

       (Japanese original by Hironobu Murakoso, Sports News Department)

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