Pin Trading Is the Olympic Sport You’ve Never Heard Of

There’s a lot of mystery about what goes on behind the scenes at the Olympic Games. As a former Olympian, I’m sorry to tell you that it’s not all sex or bust as the headlines might lead you to believe. But flirting is one of the many strategies an athlete can use toward a different, less risky type of social connection, and it all starts with the classic pickup line: “Do you have a pin to trade?”

Pin-trading is a favorite pastime of many Olympians, in which athletes trade country-specific or sport-specific pins in an effort to collect from and connect with as many teams as possible. The practice dates back to the origins of the modern Games in 1896, when “pins” were cardboard disks that delegations wore for the purposes of identification. Today, pins are highly decorative, sought-after enamel tchotchkes used for trade, collection, and social networking.

It’s not just athletes that do it: it’s a currency for fans (hi, Prince Harry), staffers, and reporters alike. Dubbed the official “spectator sport” of the Games, it has even spawned its own avid community of “pinheads,” one of whom collected more than 600 pins over the course of a single Games. In recent years, more and more entities have created their own pins, from corporate sponsors to local retail and government agencies.

As with any Olympic sport, this game has rules too: the International Association of Olympic Collectors has delineated proper pin-trading etiquette, and the Olympin Collectors Club has compiled a compendium of pins as sorted by nation and year. Individually, pins aren’t worth that much, especially when compared to the value of medals, mascots, and other memorabilia (though they are doing better than stamps). But it’s not really the monetary value that draws people into this sport.

For spectators, pins are a way to participate in the chaos of Olympic fervor, with 15 million tourists estimated to descend upon Paris for the 2024 Games. One pinhead described them as being “more important than money” during the duration of the Games, since a highly coveted pin could earn a person access to exclusive parties, be accepted as tip fare, or lead to a memorable swap with a random celebrity athlete on the streets.

But while the pin is valuable for athletes, the process of the trade is what really proves priceless. As a gymnast at the Rio 2016 Games, I would walk up to someone new each day, having pretense to start a conversation. Cafeterias are intimidating places for your average pre-pubescent middle schooler, but they are even more intimidating for your slightly-more-pubescent rhythmic gymnast (I was 16). The Olympic dining hall is bigger than two football fields, and everyone is either eating with their own cohort or minding their own business. It’s a tough crowd to find your way into— unless you have some pins at the ready.

To a group of Fiji rugby players: “Hey, do any of you guys have any pins? No? Well, can I sit here with you anyway for lunch?”

To a lone table tennis athlete from China: “Hi… have you gotten an American pin yet? Yes? Well what about this Canadian one I just traded for instead?”

To a random official with an IOC badge: “So… what’s your story? Do you have a pin to trade?”

To an unidentifiable athletic person: “Got pins?”

Not everyone speaks English, but if you can’t exchange conversation, at least you can trade pins.

But because these pins are worth gold, trading them necessitates strategy. The one downside to representing a big team like America, for example, is that its pins are oversaturated in the market: at almost every recent Olympic Games, Team USA has the largest delegation (in Tokyo, team USA had 613 athletes; in Paris, we’ll have 592). Since rhythmic gymnasts typically compete on the last two days of the Games, I was at yet another disadvantage: by the time I arrived at the Village, most athletes had already traded with an American.

So I needed to get a little creative. Instead of trading my pins whenever, wherever, with whomever, I developed some know-how over the span of two Olympic Games, one Youth Olympic Games, one Pan American Games, and a University Games.

If you’re an athlete in a team sport as opposed to an individual one, the logistics are easier: there’s always a corresponding athlete on the teams you’re paired with for training and competition, so there’s naturally more inter-mingling going on. As an individual athlete, there is less opportunity for such casual contexts for trading. But conversely, as an individual athlete, you get the upside of being a free agent with full rein over how you spend your down-time: there is no responsibility to inform others of your whereabouts, nor any trades you feel obligated to make.

If you’re an athlete in a bigger sport— like swimming, artistic gymnastics, or track and field— or in a smaller one like my own— aka rhythmic gymnastics— it helps in any case to pay attention to the country demographics of your sport. Eastern European countries dominate rhythmic gymnastics, and while the graphic design of this region’s pins were never my personal aesthetic, athletes have different priorities (like wanting to collect pins from countries they don’t normally encounter in their sport), which means that a trade with an Azerbaijani gymnast could hold weight for me in making secondary trades down the line. Knowing the approximate country spread of your own sport thus keys you into which countries you’ll have the easiest access to, while knowing the country spread of other sports keys you into which athletes to seek out.