■Paris Olympics™ Men’s Gymnastics Team Final (June 30th, Paris-Arena)

In the men’s gymnastics team final, Japan won the gold medal after a fierce battle with their rival China. In the final event, the horizontal bar, Japan, who was in second place, overtook China, who was in first place, in a dramatic turn of events, and regained the title for the first time in eight years since the 2016 Rio Olympics.

There are five members of “Gymnastics Japan” competing in the team final. They are ace gymnast Taiki Hashimoto (22), who won gold medals in the individual all-around and horizontal bar events at the Tokyo Olympics; captain Kazuma Kaya (27), who won bronze on the pommel horse at the Tokyo Olympics; Wataru Tanigawa (28), who will be competing in his second consecutive Olympics; Masataka Sugino (25), who will be competing for the first time; and the youngest member, Shinnosuke Oka (20), who won gold in the individual all-around at the 2019 World Junior Championships.

Japan’s first floor skier, Kaya, scored 14.000. Second-place skier, Hashimoto, showed off his high jumping ability and pumped his fist with all his might, giving the team a high score of 14.633. The third skier, Oka, also landed perfectly on the final jump, smiling, and scored the same 14.633 as Hashimoto, getting off to a good start in second place.

The second event was the pommel horse. Kaya showed off a stable performance, yelling “Yosh!” after landing and scoring 14.366. Next, pommel horse specialist Sugino also showed off a beautiful turn to the fullest, scoring a high score of 14.866. However, the last one, Hashimoto, unexpectedly fell in the middle of her performance. She was heavily penalized, scoring 13.100, which was in the 13-point range, and Japan dropped to third place. The United States came in first, and China came in second, 0.5 points behind.

The third event was the rings. Kaya, Oka, and Tanigawa all finished without mistakes, but China, which is good at rings, performed better than Japan. Japan finished the first half in fifth place. The gap with China, which was in first place, widened to 3.133.

Sugino and Hashimoto scored high in the fourth event, vault. China’s third athlete scored in the 12-point range, narrowing the gap with China to 1.799. Ukraine came in second, the United States in third, and Japan in fourth. With a gap of 0.864 with the United States, the medal battle is becoming fierce.

Although Japan was unable to improve its score in the fifth event, the parallel bars, it rose to second place, 3.267 points behind China, who placed first, and headed into the final event, the horizontal bar. Sugino, the first to do so, landed perfectly and handed the ball over to Oka.
Oka also performed with a calmness that was hard to believe for the youngest competitor, and pumped his fist in the air. Immediately afterwards, the second Chinese competitor fell twice, resulting in a large deduction in points. Japan’s final performer, Hashimoto, then performed on the horizontal bar. Hashimoto successfully performed the Liukin, Cassina, and Coleman moves one after the other, and landed brilliantly. He pumped his right hand in the air with all his might, and made a stunning comeback against China.