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Or, one could be like Elizabeth Swaney or "Eric the Eel", or "Eddie the Eagle" and be the top competitor from their represented country: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Swaney

Compared to the best in the world, they were all still not very good. But on the metric of being able to make it to the Olympics, they were all geniuses.

And meanwhile, there's Steven Bradbury who 20 years ago, legitimately won a gold medal in short track speed skating: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Bradbury

It seems to me that that "top" is often a nebulous term.