An Olympian broke his tooth in 2010 after biting his silver medal at the Winter Games, but winning athletes in Paris have kept up the tradition, striking the biting pose upon receiving their coveted metal discs.
Carlos Yulo did it himself and put each of his gold medals between his teeth. Why so?
The most common answer is a “purity check,” as explained on the Olympics website.
“History says that, during the early days, traders bit their gold coins to check their authenticity when the precious metal was used as a form of currency,” the article states. Pure gold, after all, is soft and gets a dent when gnawed.
But that is no longer the case today, as medals have not been made of pure gold since 1912. Medals today are compounds of 90% silver and six grams of gold, according to UK’s The Independent.
For the Paris Summer Games, the medals even contain a tiny wrought-iron piece chipped off from the iconic Eiffel Tower.
So, what’s the real reason? It’s the photographers.
Photojournalists ask athletes to pose for what they consider the money shot for front pages around the world.
“It’s become an obsession with the photographers,” said David Wallechinsky, president of the International Society of Olympic Historians, as quoted on the Olympics website.
Athletes also respond to loud cues from photographers. “They wear you down, and they make you bite it,” U.S. Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughlin told Parade last month.
However, David Moeller, the German luger who broke his tooth, discourages the practice.
“The photographers wanted a picture of me holding the medal just with my teeth… Later at dinner, I noticed a bit of one of my teeth was missing,” he was quoted as saying.
