Perfect 10 (gymnastics)

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File:Nadia Comaneci 1.00.jpg
Nadia Comăneci poses beside the scoreboard that recorded her perfect 10 as 1.00.

Perfect 10 refers to a score of 10.00 for a single routine in artistic gymnastics, which was once thought to be unattainable—particularly at the Olympic Games—under the code of points set by the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG). The first person to score a perfect 10 at the Olympic Games was Romanian Nadia Comăneci, at the 1976 Games in Montreal. Other women who accomplished this feat at the Olympics include Mary Lou Retton in 1984 and Daniela Silivaș in 1988. The first man to score a perfect 10 was Alexander Dityatin, at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.

The FIG changed its code of points in 2006. There are now different top scores, all greater than 10, for the various events, based upon difficulty and artistic merit; there is no consistent perfect score.

History

Men's Artistic Gymnastics had been an Olympic sport since the beginning of the modern games. Women's gymnastics were introduced as a single (team) event in the 1928 games, but were not expanded until the 1952 games, when there were seven events.[1] The International Federation of Gymnastics first drew up a code of points—for men—in 1949.[2]

Although the code of points was based on a maximum of 10, until 1976 it was considered impossible to achieve a score of greater than 9.95.[3][4] Before the 1976 Olympics in Montreal, Omega, the official timers, asked the International Olympic Committee how many digits it should allow on the electronic scoreboard, and were told that three digits would be sufficient, as a score of 10.00 would not be possible.[5]

On 18 July 1976, 14-year-old Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci performed in the uneven bars event, and was awarded a score of 10. Because the scoreboard only allowed three digits, it had to display her score as 1.00.[5] This led to total confusion, with even Comăneci unsure of what it meant, until the announcer informed the elated crowd that she had scored a perfect 10.[6] An iconic press photograph (pictured above) shows a beaming Comăneci, arms upraised, beside the scoreboard.[7] Comăneci scored a total of seven 10s at the 1976 Olympics—four on the uneven bars and three on the balance beam.[5] Her main rival, Russian Nelli Kim, scored two 10s in the same competition, in the vault and floor exercise.[8] Comăneci's coach, Béla Károlyi, having defected to the United States in 1981, subsequently coached Mary Lou Retton to gold at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, where she scored 10s in the vault and floor exercise.[9]

The first man to score a perfect 10 in Olympic competition was the Russian Alexander Dityatin, who received the score in the vault on the way to a record-breaking eight medals in the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.[10] Among other men to achieve the score was Comăneci's future husband, Bart Conner, who received three 10s in Los Angeles in 1984.[11]

Change in scoring

The code of points came under review as a result of separate incidents during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, in which gymnasts were believed to have received excessively low scores.[12] A new scoring system was introduced in 2006. It consists of an "A" score, based on the difficulty of elements, and a "B" score, based on artistic impression. While the B score still has a maximum of 10, it is only a part of the overall score.[11]

The change had its share of critics. "It's crazy, terrible, the stupidest thing that ever happened to the sport of gymnastics," complained noted coach Béla Károlyi.[13] "It's hard to understand. I don't even understand it,"[13] remarked gymnast Mary Lou Retton. Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci commented, "It's so hard to define sports like ours and we had something unique. The 10, it was ours first and now you give it away."[11]

List of perfect 10s

This list may be incomplete.

Olympics

Montreal, 1976

  • Nadia Comăneci (7) - uneven bars (team compulsory, team optionals, individual all-around, event finals) and balance beam (team optionals, individual all-around, event finals);
  • Nellie Kim (3) - all-around and individual vault, individual floor exercise;

(Olympic database;[14] Women's individual results;[15] women's all-around results;[16] women's team results[17])

Moscow, 1980

Men
Women[citation needed]

(Men's all-around results;[18] men's individual event results[19])

Los Angeles, 1984

Men
  • Li Ning (5) - individual floor exercise and pommel horse; pommel horse, rings, and vault in the team final
  • Tong Fei (4) - high bar in the individual, all-around, and team events; team rings
  • Koji Gushiken (3) - individual and team high bar; all-around vault
  • Lou Yun (3) - individual vault; vault in both rounds of the team final
  • Shinji Morisue (3) - high bar in the individual and both rounds of the team final
  • Peter Vidmar (3) - all-around high bar; pommel horse in the individual and team finals
  • Bart Conner (2) - parallel bars in both the team and individual events
  • Mitch Gaylord (2) - team parallel bars and rings
  • Tim Daggett - team high bar
  • Li Xiaoping - team pommel horse
  • Xu Zhiqiang - team high bar
Women
  • Julianne McNamara (5) - individual uneven bars and floor exercise; all-around uneven bars; team uneven bars and floor exercise
  • Ecaterina Szabo (4) - floor exercise; all-around balance beam; team vault and floor exercise
  • Ma Yanhong (3) - individual, all-around, and team uneven bars
  • Mary Lou Retton (3) - floor exercise and vault in the all-around; vault in the team event
  • Simona Păucă - team balance beam

(Men's results;[20] women's results[21])

Seoul, 1988

Men
Women
  • Daniela Silivaș (7) - compulsory, team, all-around, and individual uneven bars, team balance beam, compulsory and all-around floor
  • Yelena Shushunova (7) - compulsory, team, and all-around vault, team and individual uneven bars, team and all-around
  • Dagmar Kersten (2) - compulsory, and individual uneven bars

(Men's results;[22] women's results[23])

Barcelona, 1992

(Women's results[24])

World Championships

  • Daniela Silivaş, 1985, 1987, and 1989 World Gymnastics Championships
  • Aurelia Dobre, 1987 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships (five times)
  • Svetlana Boginskaya, 1989 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships (1) - floor exercise

European Championships

  • Vera Caslavska - 1967 European Artistic Gymnastics Championships (2) - all-around floor exercise, individual balance beam.[25]

References

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  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Archived February 12, 2010 at the Wayback Machine
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