Wednesday, August 1, 2012

2012 Men's Gymnastic Olympic Team: Biggest Stars from Early Action

With the Men's Team and Men's Individual All-Around events completed and the medalists already swelling up with pride on their respective podiums, the focus of the men's gymnastics world now turns to the individual events. 

A number of men have either made or continued to make a name for themselves with their stellar performances over the first week of the London Olympics

These three in particular have made a lot of noise with their showings in the completed events: 

 

Danell Leyva, USA

Along with American teammate John Orozco, Cuban-born Danell Leyva struggled immensely during the team competition and was one of the primary contributors to the USA's disappointing fifth-place finish. 

Leyva's score of 13.4 on the pommel horse left him in 20th place for that leg of the competition and severely hindered his country's chances of landing on the podium. 

You can be sure that visions of his letdown were filling his mind before the start of the all-arounds, even more so after another poor performance on the pommel horse. This time, Leyva improved marginally, choosing a routine of low difficulty and executing it moderately well for a score of 13.5—the 19th best in the all-arounds.

Leyva could have let that bother him throughout the rest of the competition, but instead bounced back and showed off his strong mental game.

He closed his showing with great routines on both the parallel and high bars, finishing tied for first and alone in the top spot, respectively. Those pressure-packed routines allowed him to nudge past Ukraine's Mykola Kuksenkov for the bronze medal. 

As disappointing as some of his experiences in London may have been, Leyva showed a great amount of mental fortitude and won the hearts of many on Wednesday. 


Cyril Tommasone, France

This French gymnast has proven to be quite the specialist on the pommel horse thus far, showing off magnificent routine after magnificent routine. 

Although he was a member of the French squad that placed eighth in the finals of the team competition, Tommasone stood out for his work on his best leg. He couldn't place in the top 10 on the floor exercise, vault or parallel bars, but the 25-year-old was beat out by only Louis Smith on his favorite portion of the event. 

Tommasone didn't best his 15.466 during the all-arounds, posting a 15.333, but he did take home the top score on the pommel horse. 

He'll be back in action again and competing for a gold when he attempts to beat out Great Britain's Smith and Hungary's Krisztian Berki for the pommel horse crown. 


Kohei Uchimura, Japan

Kohei Uchimura has enjoyed quite the 2012 Olympics thus far, competing in all six events during the team competition to help Japan win a silver medal and then taking home the gold during the individual all-arounds. 

No one could even keep it close during the all-arounds, despite the fact that Uchimura took a minor spill during the floor exercise and "only" posted a 15.1. 

Uchimura already had won three-straight all-around world titles and a silver medal at Beijing during the 2008 Summer Olympics. Now, he's furthered his claim not only as the world's brightest star in men's gymnastics, but arguably as the greatest of all time in his sport. 

Even Leyva has nothing but respect for him:

"If I spoke Japanese, I would tell him that he is the best gymnast that ever lived – so far. I'm going to keep working to beat him," Leyva said. "His gymnastics is just so beautiful. ... I'm working toward that. I'm not trying to copy his style, I have my own style. I need to perfect me more to beat him." 

With second-place finishes on the pommel horse, rings—including a sensational pose in which he hung upside down and transitioned into a handstand without making the supporting cables so much as move—and horizontal bars, as well as a top showing on the vault, Uchimura dominated the competition. 

Watching him is nothing short of watching a master at work. 

Source: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1281569-2012-mens-gymnastic-olympic-team-biggest-stars-from-early-action

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