The Paris 2024 Olympic Games will be remembered as the moment African sport arrived on equal terms with the world's traditional athletic powers. African nations collectively won 89 medals — 67% more than at Tokyo 2020 — with representation across disciplines that were once near-exclusively dominated by European and North American athletes.
Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, and Morocco led the medal table for the continent, but the most significant story was the breadth: Uganda won its first-ever swimming medal, Senegal claimed bronze in wrestling and silver in taekwondo, and Rwanda won medals in cycling and long-distance running.
The Training Revolution
Behind the numbers lies a structural transformation: for the first time, the majority of African champions were trained primarily on the continent rather than abroad. A new generation of African sports academies — many backed by sovereign wealth funds and continental development banks — have developed world-class coaching, nutrition, and sports science infrastructure.