If it looked like Joseph Schooling had a little extra motivation when he beat Michael Phelps and the rest of the field for the gold medal in the men’s 100-meter butterfly Friday night in Rio, it’s because he did.
Joseph Schooling is about to become a millionaire. He gets $1 million SGD from the govt as reward for the gold medal.
— Stefanie Loh (@StefanieLoh) August 13, 2016
Those one million Singapore dollars translates to about $740,000 U.S, according to Google’s currency converter on Saturday morning.
MORE: Schooling begs Phelps to return, but he says no
The interesting twist here is that Schooling is attending and swimming for the University of Texas. But the NCAA adopted a small change in its amateurism rules a year ago — it went into effect in August 2015 — that will allow for the first time Olympians to keep their rewards. According to USA Today:
But, according to the rationale statement that accompanied the 2015 rules change: “Unlike other legislation related to benefits from the USOC or national governing body, the exception for the Operation Gold program does not apply to international student-athletes. Establishing a similar exception for benefits provided by international equivalents of the USOC … promotes student-athlete well-being and fairness among elite level student-athletes and reduces compliance monitoring concerns.”
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Schooling’s performance triggered a payout from what is called the Multi-Million Dollar Award Programme — so named because athletes in an individual Olympic event can win up to $1 million (Singapore) for a gold medal and a team can win up to $2 million (Singapore). The money comes primarily from a Singapore National Olympic Council sponsorship deal with Tote Board, a company comprising a variety of wagering enterprises.
Under the incentive program’s rules, Schooling will have to give 20% of his award money to the Singapore Swimming Association, but he’ll still be left with a tidy sum.
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Singapore’s gold-medal bonus, in fact, is the largest in the world, according to a list compiled by Fox Sports Australia (and converted to U.S. dollars by Yahoo! Sports on Thursday). While the U.S. is ninth among countries that offer a financial incentive for medals, Americans get just a $25,000 bonus for winning a gold, which indicates huge drops among the countries at the top of list (U.S. athletes earn a $15,000 bonus for silver and $10,000 for bronze).
Gold medal bonuses for Rio Olympics
Singapore $753,000
Indonesia $383,000
Azerbaijan $255,000
Kazakhstan $230,000
Italy $185,000
France $66,000
Russia $61,000
South Africa $36,000
United States $25,000
Germany $20,000
Canada $15,000
Australia $15,000