A confusing example of Noun Modifiers

I have an example of Modification of Nouns in English from a realy valid book.It says there are two types of modifiers:adj. modifiers, and noun modifiers but it gives an example on both sides which is pretty puzzling:

Adjective Modifiers(modifiers are bolded):

He won a gold* medal in the 1000-meter race in the seventeenth winter Olympics.

Noun Modifiers(modifiers are bolded):

He won a gold* medal in the 1000-meter race in the seventeenth winter Olympics.

Then it says,"The word gold can be considered a noun or an adjective, depending on wether it refers to the material or the color."

But after that it indicates that adj. modifiers have 11 types which are colors,material and 9 more.So can anyone tell me why the word gold could be a noun there?

Solution 1:

I think the book you have has expressed this point poorly.

In this case gold can be either a noun or adjective modifier, but as a noun modifier it is not really about the material that the medal is made from but what the material signifies, namely coming first. Gold medal is in that sense equivalent to winners' medal (i.e. first place) rather than either gold-coloured medal or made-from-gold medal. In winners medal we have a noun modifier, in the other two an adjective modifier.