Is New Zealand the medals per capita Winter Olympics champions? Not so fast

New Zealand's Nico Porteous, right, poses with his bronze medal. Photo / AP

It's never too long after New Zealand wins any type of medal at an Olympics that you hear three words - medals per capita.

It's a phrase that is meant to typify little old New Zealand. 'Look at us. We have only four million people but we have more medals than India – a country that has 1.3 billion'.

Following the two bronze medals achieved by 16-year-olds Nico Porteous and Zoi Sadowski-Synnott in PyeongChang New Zealand is placed 25th on the Winter Olympics medal table, tied with Spain a country that as a population of 46.56 million. An impressive effort.

Bad news however. Despite those two medals, New Zealand still sits quite far down on the medals per capita table, according to medalspercapita.com.

Liechtenstein leads the way courtesy of Tina Weirather's bronze in the ladies' Super G. The principality, bordered by Austria and Switzerland, has a population of 37,531. That is a population less than Wanganui.

The nation even beats New Zealand when it comes to medal droughts. Yesterday Sadowski-Synnott became New Zealand's first medallist since Annelise Coberger in 1992. Weirather's bronze ended a 30 year drought for Liechtenstein going back to the 1988 Calgary Games.

Listen to "Zoi Sadowski-Synnott reacts to her bronze win" on Spreaker.

Even more impressive on the per-capita stakes however is Norway. With a population of 5.1 million Norway sits on top of the medal tally with 35 medals. That places Norway second on the medals per capita with 148,454 population per medal.

New Zealand is in 13th at 2,297,850 population per medal, still six spots above Australia who have won three medals in South Korea, 21st in medals per land size and 17th in medals per GDP.

The positive is that New Zealand actually sits on the medal table - the first time we can say that at the Winter Olympics in 26 years.

Listen to "Nico Porteous: 'Best skiing of my life' couldn't have done any better 'in my dreams'" on Spreaker.