Biles wins record-equalling fourth gold

A day after a wobbly performance on the beam ended the American's hopes of leaving Rio with a record haul of five golds for a female gymnast, she was back on form to capture the floor title with 15.966 points.

Published : Aug 16, 2016 23:20 IST , Rio de Janeiro

Simone Biles went on to win a record-equalling fourth gold at the Olympics on Tuesday.
Simone Biles went on to win a record-equalling fourth gold at the Olympics on Tuesday.
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Simone Biles went on to win a record-equalling fourth gold at the Olympics on Tuesday.

Simone Biles showed off her sassy moves and explosive tumbles on the floor exercise to win a record-equalling fourth gold at the Olympics on Tuesday.

A day after a wobbly performance on the balance beam ended the American's hopes of leaving Rio with a record haul of five golds for a female gymnast, she was back on form to capture the floor title with 15.966 points.

Aly Raisman completed a one-two for the United States by earning 15.500, while Briton Amy Tinkler burst into tears after a crowd-pleasing floor display to Kenny G's version of the song "Oh, Pretty Woman” earned her the bronze.

However, there was no doubting who was the star of the show.

A sultry routine full of hip-swinging moves to samba music had the Brazilian crowd on their feet as she flew high into the air to execute her trademark element, a soaring double layout with half-twist at the end.

Cries of “oohs” and “aahs” accompanied each of her complex tumbling passes, she drew gasps of admiration as she balanced her entire body weight on her right toes while spinning around twice and had the audience roaring their approval as she bounced her bottom off the floor to strike her final pose.

The ear-to-ear grin, which had disappeared on Monday after she ended up with bronze on the beam, was back on show again and Biles gave the crowd a thumbs up as she waited for her score.

The mark that did flash up not only earned her a fifth medal at her debut Games, it was also the highest score of her four floor performances over the past 10 days.

The 19-year-old team, all around, vault and floor exercise champion became the first woman in 32 years, and fifth overall, to win four golds at a single Games.

The Soviet Union's Larisa Latynina (Melbourne 1956), Hungary's Agnes Keleti (Melbourne 1956), Czech Vera Caslavska (Mexico City 1968) and Romania's Ecaterina Szabo (Los Angeles 1984) were the only other women to have four golds at a single Games.

Ukraine's Verniaiev wins men's parallel bars gold

Ukrainian Oleg Verniaiev made up for his near miss in the all-around competition by winning the parallel bars gold at the Rio Olympics on Tuesday.

Verniaiev, who came agonisingly close to ending the all-around reign of Japan's Kohei Uchimura before missing out on gold by 0.099 of a point, finally got his hands on the top prize by winning the bars with a total of 16.041.

He beat American silver medallist Danell Leyva by 0.141 of a point. Russia's David Belyavskiy had to settle for bronze.

The Chinese men's gymnastics team will leave Rio without a gold medal after World Champion You Hao and Deng Shudi finished out of the medals.

Hambuechen wins horizontal bar gold

Germany's Fabian Hambuechen soared past his rivals with a heart-stopping routine on the horizontal bar to win the Olympic gold on Tuesday.

The 28-year-old finally claimed the top prize at his fourth Olympics, triumphing with a score of 15.766. American Danell Leyva picked up his second silver of the day after also finishing second on the parallel bars, while Britain's Nile Wilson took the bronze.

Epke Zonderland's hopes of back-to-back golds ended when he suffered a crash landing midway through his routine. He finished seventh out of eight finalists with 14.033.

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