The Good
- SANNE
- Simone putting everything together in a major international AA for the first time since 2013
- The MAG team and AA finals
- Laurie Hernandez, that pure child, on beam
- The Dutch royal family celebrating after the beam final
- Simone Biles has a vault title
- A relatively injury-free competition on the WAG side
- Bars. What a wonderful crop of top routines we've had.
- A Dutch Olympic beam champion
- Ellie Downie coming back after her scary fall on floor pretty much whole and fine
- Aly's redemption from four years ago
- Lieke supporting Sanne in the beam final
- Oleg Verniaiev is an Olympic champion!!!!
- Max Whitlock's amazing success
- A non-Big Four medalist in all WAG EFs!!
- The Russians- on both sides- pulling out all the consistency they got
- A beam champion with a unique routine that INCLUDES A RISKY MOUNT!!
- Wang Yan suddenly becoming a rock (shoutout to Seda for doing the same in QF and TF)
- Giulia Steingruber is an OLYMPIC MEDALIST!
- SANNE WEVERS IS OLYMPIC BEAM CHAMPION I CAN DIE HAPPY!!!!
The Bad
- The sea of potential bronze medalists in the WAG AA all trying to give the medal to someone else and then the only one who had a hit day getting screwed over by the judges
- So many scary vaults in the EF
- So many injuries in the MAG AA
- What even was some of that scoring?
- Only two gymnasts hit their routines without major error in the EF THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A MORE CONSISTENT GROUP
The Ugly
- THAT injury
- The whole Ukraine TF fiasco
- Epke's HB EF fall
Better, Worse, or the Same Compared to London (the competition that converted me to a real fan):
Team: Better. The US might have been infinitely more untouchable, but I'll take the four-way battle between Russia, China, GB, and Japan for silver and bronze, even if the medals ended up going to the other two Big Four countries, over the two-way each battles for gold (which was pretty well decided after two rotations) and bronze from London.
All Around: Worse. Gold and silver clinched before the beginning of the competition, and the depressing implosion of the potential bronze medalists. This should have been an epic knock-down drag-out for bronze. Alas.
Vault: Better. For the first time since the new scoring system, we have an Olympic vault podium without a fall! And Giulia medalled, making it instantly 10X better.
Bars: The Same. The gymnasts who had major errors were way more influential in this one than in London, and there was a lot of similarity in Daria, Aliya, and Maddie's routines, but the overall quality of bars has just risen so much this quad. And the Germans, Songsong, and JLo all have exciting routines, and a surprise medalist!
Beam: The Same. There's probably a bit of my Sanne stan coming through in that rating. There were the same number of gymnasts who actually hit their routines properly in both finals, and though there were larger errors among the rest (and on the podium), the winning routine was far more original. And Sanne won, I can't actually care about anything else.
Floor: The Same. Again, gold and silver were pretty much already decided, and Giulia had her issues, taking the third-best out of contention. But the overall field was of the same quality as London, and the routines were overall more engaging. And a great field of gymnasts from all over!
Best Finals: MAG TF, WAG TF, and MAG AA. All had super deep fields with the battles for medals going right down to the wire!
My Favorite Non-gym Olympic Moment: It would have been unarguably my favorite if SANNE WEVERS hadn't become Olympic beam champion. The Fijian rugby team singing a hymn and praying together after their victory and kneeling to receive their medals. I NEVER cry at sports- I din't cry at either of Sanne's major beam medals- and this brought tears to my eyes.
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