Men gymnasts finish no higher than 8th (08/04/96)

Men gymnasts finish no higher than 8th

by Roman Woronowycz

ATLANTA - Rustam Sharipov and Oleksander Svitlychny placed eighth and ninth, respectively, in the men's individual all-around gymnastics competition on July 24.

The two, along with countryman Ihor Korobchynsky had qualified for the competition based on their performances in the team competition held 48 hours earlier, in which Ukraine had won the bronze medal behind the Russian Federation and China.

The three, especially Sharipov, are methodical and technically well-trained. However, they lacked the flare and charisma that seems to be needed to reach the rarefied air of the medal positions.

Sharipov scored above 9.6 in five of the six events, even hitting a 9.750 on the parallel bars, but faltered badly on the vault in his second rotation, unable to stick either of his two attempts and scoring only 9.4.

After the first rotation, essentially the competition was a duel between Li Xiaoshuang of China and the new star of men's gymnastics, 21-year-old Russian Alexei Nemov.

Xiaoshuang got stronger with each event, after a poor effort in his first rotation, the floor exercise. He took over first place in the third rotation when he scored 9.775 on the rings and sealed his victory with a 9.812 in the vault, the highest mark for anyone that evening.

Nemov made a valiant attempt to retake the lead with strong showings in the floor exercise and on the horizontal bar, but came up short by .049 points, giving Xiaoshuang the gold.

Vitaliy Scherbo, the 1992 Barcelona Games all-around champion, took the bronze. He came on strong in the end, after blowing it on the rings in his second rotation, with a strong performance in the floor exercise, earning a 9.762, but that wasn't enough.

Korobchynsky, the third Ukrainian gymnast who qualified for the all-around competition, finished in 15th place.

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