Third Olympic final for Matteo Morandi who today, at the rings, will try to bring home the first Italian medal in artistic gymnastics. It is a challenge within the reach of the air force sergeant, born in Vimercate (Monza), who qualified with an excellent score, just a hair's breadth away (a tenth of a point) from the Chinese Yibing Chen, gold in Beijing.
Morandi has a great responsibility, but also a promising tradition behind him. In fact, Italians are excellent gymnasts, from Franco Menichelli, born in 1941, gold in Tokyo in floor exercise in 1964, to the great Jury Dimitri Chechi, gold medalist at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, to Igor Cassina, gold medal on the barre in Athens 2004, inventor of the famous Cassina movement, a straight double somersault with the addition of a twist.
Matteo may not have the agility of the legendary Jury Chechi, the "lord of the rings", but he has the flair and imagination to win a medal and to transform himself into the artist of the rings. He's a strong athlete, with disciplined muscles like tireless warriors and a big heart, like his favorite actor and director Clint Eastwood. Today could be his last Olympic chance and he must try to seize it, appealing to its main quality, tenacity, and its main flaw, stubbornness, basically sides of the same "coin".
In addition to the Chinese champion, there are 6 great athletes competing for the podium: the Brazilian Arthur Nabarrete Zanetti; the Russians Denis Ablyazin and Aleksandr Balandin; Puerto Rican Tommy Ramos; the Argentine Federico Molinari; the Bulgarian Iordan Iovtchev.
Honor also to Alberto Busnari, fourth in the pommel horse final that took place yesterday. Busnari did an exemplary exercise, to the maximum of his possibilities, rewarded with a score of 15,400. However, the hope of a medal was extinguished almost immediately, after the exercise of the Englishman Max Whitlock (19 years old) who obtained 15,600 thanks to the inclusion of a few more difficulties than the qualifiers and flawless execution. At that point the podium was compromised, because the match for the gold has always been between the British Louis Smith and the Ukrainian Krisztian Berki. Incredible but true, the two champions obtained a copycat score, 16,066, and the gold went to the most perfect gymnast (the score is the result of the difficulty coefficient added to the execution), ie Berki. The law of artistic gymnastics is this: you have to accept the evaluation of the judges and the subtle differences that only they can grasp. But it's their job and it's assumed they know how to do it.
Busnari's comment was very sporty: “I did my best, congratulations to Whitlock who evidently did better. I didn't expect it, but he is young and good ”. The gymnast from Melzo (Milan) is truly a great athlete he also leaves behind his sport the “busnari movement” now internationally recognized.
Finally, in the floor exercise, the golden man of artistic gymnastics is still the Chinese Kai Zou, already first in Beijing, who yesterday created a perfect platform, with a series of acrobatic diagonals to leave you breathless. Good face and smiling, the "Chinese" took home his second gold medal at these Olympics, after first place in the team event. Silver for Kohei Uchimura, the Japanese gold in the all around final, very famous in his homeland and protagonist of these games; bronze for the Russian Denis Ablyazin.
