London 2012: Results Event Finals Day 1

Well, what a start to the first day of the Event Finals. The floor final was without any drama, Zou Kai led from a strong start and retained his Olympic Floor title.

The women’s Vault final however was extremely interesting. Canada’s Ellie Black scored a 0.000 for her first vault, after taking sometime with her coach to calm herself, she got ready for her second vault yet darted of the runway just as she was about to hit the springboard. Following this we saw images of her limping from the podium with the team attending to her foot and leg with ice. Yamilet Pena Abreu attempted her handspring double front vault, landing her feet first but sitting her landing. Maria “Bee Farm” Paseka vaulted well to put herself in contention for a medal behind Germany’s 16 year old Janine Berger who was leading the score table right up until the last few vaults. Poor Oksana Chusovitina tried her hardest but failed to complete her final Olympic Games with another Olympic Vault medal.  World Vault Champion McKayla Maroney completed her Amanar, not quite as good as in team finals but still great, then the upset came. Maroney was destined for gold, thought to be unbeatable until we saw her land her second vault sitting. She did land feet first however so was not awarded a 0.000. She slotted into first place with Romania’s Sandra Izbasa still to go. A shocked and stunned Izbasa took the gold, Maroney looking equally as shocked and very subdued.

The Men’s Pommel Horse final was another interesting competition. The fight for gold was always between Louis Smith and Krisztian Berki. I had never heard thoughts of two British men on the podium for Pommel final, but did however here how it was possible that two Hungarian’s could share the podium with Smith. Max Whitlock shot up the scoreboard and by the time Smith took to the apparatus, it was clear that no matter what happened that Great Britain had one Pommel Horse medal. Smith tied with Berki for the same score, tying for first, but as we have previously seen due to tie break rules, Berki had the higher execution score and was awarded gold.

Floor

1. ZOU Kai (CHN) 15.933
2. Kohei Uchimura (JPN) 15.800
3. Denis Ablyazin (RUS) 15.800
4. Enrique Tomas Gonzalez Sepulveda (CHI) 15.366
5. Jacob Dalton (USA) 15.333
6. Alexander Shatilov (ISR) 15.333
7. Flavius Koczi (ROU) 15.100
8. Marcel Nguyen (GER) 14.966

Women’s Vault

1. Sandra Raluca Izbasa (ROU) (15.383, 15.000) 15.191
2. McKayla Maroney (USA) (15.866, 14.300) 15.083
3. Maria Paseka (RUS) (15.400, 14.700) 15.050
4. Janine Berger (GER) (15.133, 14.900) 15.016
5. Oksana Chusovitina (GER) (15.100, 14.466) 14.783
6. Yamilet Pena Abreu (DOM) (14.566, 14.466) 14.516
7. Brittany Rogers (CAN) (14.766, 14.200) 14.483
8. Elsabeth Black (CAN) (0.000, 0.000) 0.000

Pommel Horse