Paris 2024 Olympic gymnastics silver medallists Artur Davtyan of Armenia and Zhou Yaqin of the People’s Republic of China traded silver for gold Sunday (23 February) at the Cottbus World Cup in Cottbus, Germany.
The event is the first major international competition since the Olympic Games and part of the International Gymnastics Federation’s World Cup series.
Zhou, who won silver on the balance beam behind Italy’s Alice D’Amato in Paris, was spectacular as she worked effortlessly through a front handspring, front tuck, split jump, wolf jump series to open her routine. She worked through a slight imbalance on a back handspring swingdown, before her signature side somi, tuck jump full twist combination.
She dismounted with a nearly stuck triple twist for a 14.766, a half point ahead of teammate Zhang Kexin, who took the silver medal. Japan’s Yamada Chiharu was third at 13.466.
On the floor exercise, China took two medals again, with Zhang Yihan scoring 13.433 for the win. Israel’s Lihie Raz (12.933) and Zhang Kexin (12.633) completed the podium.
In the first day of competition Saturday (22 February) 49-year-old artistic gymnast Oksana Chusovitina of Uzbekistan, returned to competition for the first time since missing a trip to her ninth Olympic Games, winning bronze on vault – her 16th medal in 21 appearances at the event.
Chusovitina was not in action on the second day of finals, having opted out of competing on the balance beam during the earlier qualifying round.
