Women across the world completely slayed the gymnastics qualification round of the Rio Olympics last night. The U.S. women’s gymnastic team has proven themselves to be nothing short of legendary. They have the opportunity to win 10 Olympic medals over the next several days, with women qualifying for every event final. The women also have earned a nearly 10-point gap lead on the second place finishers. But they weren’t the only women to turn heads. Here are a few mind-blowing highlights from the women’s gymnastics qualification round you may have missed.
1. Oksana Chusovitina of Uzbekistan, a 41-year-old gymnast, held her own and qualified for the women’s vault, where she will be competing against women, most of whom are less than half her age. To put it into perspective, U.S. team captain Aly Raisman is nicknamed “Grandma” at only 22-years-old. Chusovitina showed age is but a number with her score of 14.999 during qualifications. This will be her 7th Olympics, her first being in 1992, where she took gold for the all-around team category.
2. Ellie Downie of Great Britain put fear in the crowd after falling and landing on her neck doing a forward somersault during her floor routine, which could have resulted in a serious injury. Downie was immediately taken from the floor and put in a wheelchair by the medical staff. The 17-year-old show her fearlessness and pure strength as she recovered from shock, and continued to do two vaults that helped land Great Britain in third place amongst team rankings, assuring them a spot in tomorrow’s (August 9) 8-team final. That’s what I call girl power.
3. Simone Biles of the U.S. lived up to her almost mythical reputation, qualifying first in the all-around competition, and topping the charts in the floor exercise, vault and balance beam. She is nothing short of flawless, and will surely continue to turn heads as the competition moves forward.
4. Dipa Karmakar became the first Indian woman to make it to the Olympic final for gymnastics. The 22-year-old from Tripura will be competing in the women’s vaults finals after performing potentially incredibly dangerous Produnova vault, otherwise known as the “vault of death,” which has only been executed by five gymnasts successfully worldwide, including Karmakar.
5. Flavia Saraiva became the breakout star of the Brazil team, surprising the world with how powerful a 4’4″, 16-year-old can really be. Saraiva, a native of Rio de Janeiro, is a crowd favorite, with her sweet demeanor and incredibly sharp and neat execution during competition. She qualified to represent Brazil and compete for the all-around this Thursday (August 11). Keep an eye out for this pint-sized powerhouse.
And of course, the U.S. team had the biggest cheerleader in Leslie Jones, who is live-tweeting the Olympics and is the best thing that happened to Twitter since Kanye left (and unfortunately returned). Seriously, she’s live-tweeting right now, follow her!!
All photos courtesy of Facebook.
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