The Highest-Paid Athletes At The Rio Summer Olympics.

More than 11,000 athletes will descend on Brazil this month to take part in the 2016 Summer Olympics. For most Olympians, it’s a grind to make a living and find time to train for their Olympic dreams. An income study of U.S. track athletes ahead of the 2012 Games found that half of athletes ranked in the top 10 of their event in the U.S. earned less than $15,000 annually from all sources of income (including sponsorships, prize money and grants).

But when the International Olympic Committee first allowed professional athletes to compete at the 1986 Summer Olympics, it opened the door to another breed of Olympic athlete: the global icon in a high-profile sport. Compare the athletes struggling to make ends meet to two other Olympic athletes at Rio — Kevin Durant and Novak Djokovic are also chasing gold this month, but they earned more than $150,000 per day over the last 12 months.

Professionals across every sport, outside of wrestling, are now eligible for the Olympics, with boxing making the switch this year for the first time. The idea of sporting purity and amateurism at the Olympics went out the window a long time ago. There are 14 athletes competing in five sports in Brazil who made more than $18 million between June 2015 and June 2016, by Forbes’ count. Collectively they banked $447 million, or an average of $32 million, with 58% derived from sponsors.

Leading the way is NBA superstar Durant with $56.2 million. Durant won a gold medal with the 2012 U.S. men’s national team, but this is his first time as the team’s alpha dog since LeBron James and Kobe Bryant are not in Rio. The four-time scoring champ has been one of the NBA’s most beloved players since entering the league in 2007, but this summer became the league’s newest villain after leaving Oklahoma City as a free agent to join two-time Western Conference champion Golden State.


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