All-Around, Individual, Women

There was little doubt as to the favorite, Russian Svetlana Khorkina. She was the 1997 World Champion and won the European title in 1998 and earlier in 2000. Khorkina led the qualifying comfortably over Romanians Andreea Răducan and Simona Amânar. She then opened with a floor ex score of 9.812 and seemed on her way. However, in the vault, she missed both vaults badly, scoring only 9.343. Shaken, she moved on to her next apparatus, the uneven bars, and things got worse, as she fell off the bars and posted only a 9.012. Then things got tricky.

Several gymnasts had fallen on the vault, and Australian Allana Slater thought something looked odd about the apparatus. She thought it was too low, and when it was re-checked it was, indeed, 5 cm lower than standard. It turned out that when it was re-set after the men’s vault, the height had not been changed to the women’s height. The 18 gymnasts who had already vaulted were given the chance to perform the apparatus again, but for Khorkina, it was no help as her subsequent fall on the uneven bars gave her no shot at a medal.

Romanian Maria Olaru had predicted that she and her Romanian teammates would sweep the medals in this event and that was what appeared to happen. Răducan was placed first initially, with 38.893, with Amânar second with 38.642, and Olaru third with 38.581, as Khorkina would finish only 10th. Then four days later Răducan’s doping test came back positive for pseudoephedrine, a common ingredient found in cold medicines. The Romanian doctor Ioachim Oanâ had given Răducan the cold medicine a few days before the competition, which caused the positive test. Răducan was disqualified from the all-around but she would be allowed to keep her other Sydney medals. Oanâ was banned from the sport for four years. China’s Liu Xuan, who had only been 20th in qualifying, was moved up to receive the bronze medal.