Australia’s success in three of the five new sports at the Olympics – there were gold medals in the BMX freestyle and skateboarding and a bronze in surfing – helped take our medal tally to its highest since Beijing in 2008.

But as Australia digests the week that was and contemplates how to better it, it’s worth pointing out that 11 of the 17 gold medals and one bronze came in disciplines in which the living costs of athletes were not covered by their sporting organisations or government funding, but were paid for by one benefactor alone: the country’s richest person, Gina Rinehart.