“The fact I have come here in the London Olympics and did the routine as clean as I could and come second to Krisztian, I am happy. To get a silver medal and two bronzes in an Olympic Games is just a brilliant feeling, it really is.”
Gymnastics is a subjective sport decided by the opinion of a set of judges.
Last week Britain had silver in the men’s team final changed to bronze when the judges accepted they unfairly scored a routine by Japan.
On Sunday they were at least consistent. They awarded Smith and Berki the same overall score but the total is made up of two parts, difficulty and execution, and in a tie it is the latter that settles the matter. Berki scored 9.166 for execution of an easier routine, slightly bettering Smith’s 9.066.
“If we were in a sport where you could walk out into an arena, feed off the crowd and use that adrenalin to go faster or further I would feel different,” said Smith. “To think that someone else judged me and thought me worthy of a silver medal in an Olympics has made me so happy. To think I came so close to gold is hard but I can’t sit here with my face screwed up.”
Smith was the last to perform. He waited in the dressing room while Whitlock laid down a marker with a score of 15.600 which put him in gold position until Berki’s routine of clean, whirring circles of the pommel was finished with a clean handstand dismount.
When Smith emerged with two other gymnasts still to perform, he sat waiting on a chair listening to reggae on his iPod. Moments before stripping off he read a good-luck card from his agent reminding him of the 15-year journey to this point.
Sitting a few feet away in the front row were his team-mates, accompanied by the Duchess of Cambridge, confirming Smith’s star status in British gymnastics. Having seen Berki’s score he decided to choose the second hardest of the three routines he had prepared in advance. He did not make a single mistake and dismounted to huge applause.
A Union flag was thrown in his direction as he waited for the verdict. “It was tough to stand there waiting for the score,” he said. “I had done one of the best routines in my life. I didn’t think I had won.
“I said before that if both of us nailed our routines this would be a clash of the titans and it showed how close it was with the score.”
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar