There are 11 Olympic married couples who have won gold medals for
different nations, but only Connolly/Fikotová and Frodeno/Snowsill won
them at the same Olympics.
And again we don’t always know the date of the marriages. Interestingly, all 11 couples won their medals in the same sport.
Here are those 11 couples
Husband
There are 6 cases of Olympic married couples winning gold medals together at 2 different Olympic Games, or Olympic Winter Games.
Adding Winter is important because 4 of these were married couples in pairs figure skating, well known to most Olympic or figure skating aficionados.
These would be, in order of when they did it – Pierre Brunet and Andrée Brunet-Joly (1928/32 – only married in 1932); Oleg Protopopov and Lyudmila Belusova (1964/68); Aleksandr Zaytsev and Irina Rodnina (1976/80); and Sergey Grinkov and Ekaterina Gordeeva (1988/94).
What about married couples from different nations both winning medals of any color at the same Olympic Games?
That has happened 13 times by 12 couples, as Emmons and Kůrková-Emmons won medals in both 2004 and 2008, although they were only married in 2008. We can only confirm two married couples that won their medals while married – in addition to Emmons / Kůrková-Emmons in 2008, in 2002 there was Raphaël Poirée (FRA) and Liv Grete Skjelbreid-Poirée (NOR) in biathlon. There are two couples whose marital status at the time of their concurrent medals is uncertain, although of the others, 8 were not married while winning their medals.
In all 230 couples that were either married, eventually married, or once married, have both won Olympic medals. It has happened 31 times that they have been from different nations, but 19 of those did not occur at the same Olympic Games.
Of these 230, 150 couples won medals at the same Olympics, with the same caveat that we can’t always speak for marital status.
It has happened 29 times that these couples won medals together at two Olympics, and 3 couples won medals together at 3 Olympics, once again in pairs or dance figure skating – Brunet/Brunet-Joly (1924/28/32), Sergey Ponomarenko/Marina Klimova (1984/88/92) (URS/EUN) (ice dance), and Zhao Hongbo/Shen Xue (2002/06/10) (CHN).
Husbands and wife usually competed in the same sports while winning their medals at the Olympics. Of the 66 gold medalist couples, only 10 of them competed in different sports. Of the 230 medalist couples, 186 of them competed in the same sport
And again we don’t always know the date of the marriages. Interestingly, all 11 couples won their medals in the same sport.
Here are those 11 couples
Husband
Sport | NOC | Golds | Wife | NOC | Gold1 | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Hal Connolly | ATH | USA | 1956 | Olga Fikotová | TCH | 1956 |
Jan Frodeno | TRI | GER | 2008 | Emma Snowsill | AUS | 2008 |
Bill Toomey | ATH | USA | 1968 | Mary Rand | GBR | 1964 |
Peter Mueller | SSK | USA | 1976 | Marianne Timmer | NED | 1998/2006 |
Yuriy Siedykh | ATH | URS | 1976/80 | Nataliya Lisovskaya | URS | 1988 |
Bart Conner | GYM | USA | 1984 | Nadia Comăneci | ROU | 1976/80 |
Valery Medvedtsev | BIA | URS | 1988 | Nataliya Snytina | RUS | 1994 |
Valery Medvedtsev | BIA | URS | 1988 | Olga Pylyova | RUS | 2002/10 |
Andre Agassi | TEN | USA | 1996 | Steffi Graf | GER | 1988 |
Ids Postma | SSK | NED | 1998 | Anni Friesinger | GER | 2002/06/10 |
Matt Emmons | SHO | USA | 2004 | Kateřina Kůrková | CZE | 2008 |
There are 6 cases of Olympic married couples winning gold medals together at 2 different Olympic Games, or Olympic Winter Games.
Adding Winter is important because 4 of these were married couples in pairs figure skating, well known to most Olympic or figure skating aficionados.
These would be, in order of when they did it – Pierre Brunet and Andrée Brunet-Joly (1928/32 – only married in 1932); Oleg Protopopov and Lyudmila Belusova (1964/68); Aleksandr Zaytsev and Irina Rodnina (1976/80); and Sergey Grinkov and Ekaterina Gordeeva (1988/94).
What about married couples from different nations both winning medals of any color at the same Olympic Games?
That has happened 13 times by 12 couples, as Emmons and Kůrková-Emmons won medals in both 2004 and 2008, although they were only married in 2008. We can only confirm two married couples that won their medals while married – in addition to Emmons / Kůrková-Emmons in 2008, in 2002 there was Raphaël Poirée (FRA) and Liv Grete Skjelbreid-Poirée (NOR) in biathlon. There are two couples whose marital status at the time of their concurrent medals is uncertain, although of the others, 8 were not married while winning their medals.
In all 230 couples that were either married, eventually married, or once married, have both won Olympic medals. It has happened 31 times that they have been from different nations, but 19 of those did not occur at the same Olympic Games.
Of these 230, 150 couples won medals at the same Olympics, with the same caveat that we can’t always speak for marital status.
It has happened 29 times that these couples won medals together at two Olympics, and 3 couples won medals together at 3 Olympics, once again in pairs or dance figure skating – Brunet/Brunet-Joly (1924/28/32), Sergey Ponomarenko/Marina Klimova (1984/88/92) (URS/EUN) (ice dance), and Zhao Hongbo/Shen Xue (2002/06/10) (CHN).
Husbands and wife usually competed in the same sports while winning their medals at the Olympics. Of the 66 gold medalist couples, only 10 of them competed in different sports. Of the 230 medalist couples, 186 of them competed in the same sport
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