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Olympic Women's Gymnastics 2021: Uneven Bars Medal Winners, Scores and Results
August 1, 2021
Belgium's Nina Derwael captured the gold medal in the Tokyo Olympics women's gymnastics uneven bars competition at the Ariake Gymnastics Centre in Japan.
Derwael, who won gold in the uneven bars at the 2018 and 2019 World Championships, matched that feat Sunday for her first career Olympic medal.
The Russian Olympic Committee's Anastasia Ilyankova took home the silver medal, while the United States' Sunisa Lee, the individual all-around champion, rounded out the podium by winning bronze.
Here's a look at the full results:
1. Nina Derwael (BEL, 15.200)
2. Anastasia Ilyankova (ROC, 14.833)
3. Sunisa Lee (USA, 14.500)
4. Yufei Lu (CHN, 14.400)
5. Elisabeth Seitz (GER, 14.400)
6. Melanie de Jesus dos Santos (FRA, 14.033)
7. Yilin Fan (CHN, 13.900)
8. Angelina Melnikova (ROC, 13.066)
The difficulty value of Derwael's routine (6.7) made her the heavy favorite in the event, as it represented a three-tenths starting advantage over the next-highest difficulty in the field (Fan's 6.4) and a half-point edge or more over many of her competitors.
She still had to deliver a clean performance in order to clinch the top spot on the podium, though. Fan couldn't capitalize on the toughness of her routine, posting a 7.5 execution score to finish seventh.
Derwael didn't let the opportunity slip through her grasp, posting an 8.5 execution score, which ranked second in the field, to take the top spot.
"I'm just incredibly happy. I think I'm still dreaming and I still need to wake up and begin this day," Derwael told reporters. "But it's been an incredible journey, an incredible day and I'm going to cherish this forever."
The 21-year-old Belgian is also a two-time European champion in the discipline.
Ilyankova, the 2019 European uneven bars champion, compiled the best execution score in the final (8.533), but the difficulty gap from her 6.3 to Derwael's 6.7 was too much to make up.
Meanwhile, Lee would have won gold in the event if she matched her score from the individual all-around competition (15.3) in the discipline final. She came up short, posting a 8.3 execution score on top of her 6.2 difficulty, but she still earned her second medal of the Games.
She edged out Lu and Seitz by one-tenth of a point for third.
Looking ahead, the women's gymnastics schedule in Tokyo rolls on Monday with the floor exercise final, which is set for a 5:57 p.m. local time start (4:57 a.m. ET). Jade Carey will represent Team USA in the competition.