Determine the first two principal components for the standardized variables. Prepare a table showing the correlations of the standardized variables with the components, and the cumulative percentage of the total(standardized) sample variance explianed by the two components
Interpret the two principal components obtained in part b (Note that the first component is essentially a normalized unit vector and might measure the athletic excellence of a given nation at the various running distances)
Rank the nations based on their score on the first principal component. Does this ranking correspond with your inituitive notion of athletic excellence for the various countries