Team, Men

Despite finishing third behind Japan and Great Britain at the 2015 World Championships in Glasgow, China was looking to win the all-round team title for the third successive Olympics, particularly after heading the list of qualifiers, albeit a mere 0.056 points ahead of the USA, who were then closely followed by Russia, Japan and Great Britain. The qualification was marred by an horrific injury to French gymnast Samir Ait Said, the 2013 European Rings Champion, who broke his leg in his vault landing. Sadly for Said he had already qualified for the individual rings competition, which he was forced to miss.

Rio heralded the world’s best gymnast Kohei Uchimura and he was the inspiration behind Japan’s first Olympic team title since 2004, as they ranked first in the floor, vault and high bars. It was Russia, however, who started the better with good performances on the horse and rings, thanks to a 15.7 from Denis Ablyazin on the latter. The Chinese dominance in this event was looking shaky from early on when You Hao stumbled on his rings landing, and then more mistakes followed before You gave an outstanding performance on the parallel bars, scoring 16.166, the best of the competition, to bring China back into contention and chase Russia and Japan for the medal places, with Great Britain not far behind after ranking first on the pommel horse thanks to a 15.991 score from Max Whitlock. Going into the sixth and final rotation, Japan headed Russia by just 0.208 of a point and the two went head-to-head on the floor. Thanks to a 16.133 from Kenzo Shirai and a score of 15.600 from Uchimura, Japan secured the gold medal, ahead of the Russians with China in third and Great Britain closely behind in fourth. It was a disappointing competition for the United States, who were one of the fancied teams, but they too were struck by a series of errors which cost them and they had to settle for fifth place. It was the first time China had won a bronze medal; previously they had won only either gold or silver.