Sonia Inovan-Iovan

Romanian gymnast Sonia Inovan-Iovan competed at three Olympic Games and won two bronze medals. Iovan was part of the Romanian team that won bronze in the all-round event at the 1956 Melbourne Games. She also finished fifth in the team portable apparatus event, with her best individual performance of 11th coming in the balance beam. The following year at the European Championships she won an individual silver in the balance beam, along with individual bronze medals in the vault and all-round event. In 1958 she won bronze in the team event at the World Championships, which she followed up with another silver in the balance beam at the 1959 European Championships.

Iovan returned to the Olympics for the 1960 Roma Games where she once again won bronze in the team all-round event. She was consistent across all the events she competed in, finishing fifth in the individual all-round and vault, and sixth in the floor exercise and the uneven bars. Her third and final Olympics came four years later in Tokyo where she came sixth in the team all-round event. In 1966 and 1967 Iovan worked as a coach before becoming a university professor. After working at the University of Balamand in Lebanon in 1997, she moved to France where she lived for the rest of her life.