Anne-Marie "Ana" Padurariu ( ro, Ana Pădurariu; born August 1, 2002) is a Canadian artistic gymnast and the 2018 World Championships silver medalist on balance beam.

Early life

Ana Padurariu is of

Romanian Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language *** Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language ** Romanian cuisine, tradition ...

descent. Born in Bracebridge, Ontario, she resides in

Whitby Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Clif ...

. She attended Sinclair Secondary School. Padurariu's club is Gemini Gymnastics (located in Oshawa, Ontario), where she took up gymnastics at the age of four. Her favorite apparatus are beam and floor. Her dream is to compete at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, just as former Gemini Gymnastics gymnast

Kristina Vaculik Kristina Vaculik (born July 9, 1992) is a Canadian artistic gymnast who represented Canada at the 2012 Summer Olympics. In 2011-2012, Vaculik took a year off from Stanford University, which she is attending on a gymnastics scholarship, in order ...

did in London in 2012.

Gymnastics career

Junior

As a junior, in 2016–2017 Padurariu won every gold (five gold medals, the all-around and all four apparatus events) at the 2016 Olympic Hopes Cup, the 2017 Elite Canada, and the 2017 Canadian Artistic Gymnastics Championships and four golds (except on vault) at the 2016 Pan American Artistic Gymnastics Championships. She also did well at two international events, the City of Jesolo Trophy (Italy) and the Gymnix Junior Cup (Montreal, Canada). As a result, she was named Gymnastics Canada's junior athlete of 2017.

Senior

2018

Padurariu debuted at the senior level at the 2018 Elite Canada, winning the all-around silver. She was leading after three events, but fell on vault. Later she learned that she had two fractures in her left foot. In September 2018, Padurariu was part of the Canadian team that finished in fourth place in the team competition at the 2018 senior Pan American Artistic Gymnastics Championship. Padurariu was included in the Canadian team for the

2018 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships The 2018 Artistic Gymnastics World Championships was the 48th edition of the Artistic Gymnastics World Championships. The competition was held from October 25 – November 3, 2018, at the Aspire Academy Dome in Doha, Qatar. It was the first ti ...

in Doha, Qatar, where she helped Canada to its best-ever fourth place in the team event, and qualified in fifth place for the final on balance beam. In the beam final, she won silver with 14.100 points, behind Liu Tingting of China with 14.533 points and ahead of

Simone Biles Simone Arianne Biles (; born March 14, 1997) is an American artistic gymnast. Her seven Olympic medals tied with Shannon Miller for the most Olympic medals won by an American gymnast. Having won 25 World Championship medals, she is the most de ...

of the United States with 13.600 points. It was only the fourth worlds medal in the history of Canadian women's artistic gymnastics. Padurariu is also her country's second-ever world medalist on beam.

2019

In March Padurariu competed at the Stuttgart World Cup. She finished in second place behind

. In May she competed at the Canadian National Championships. After the first day of competition Padurariu was leading, but a fall off the balance beam on the second day allowed

Ellie Black Elsabeth Ann "Ellie" Black (born September 8, 1995) is a Canadian artistic gymnast. She is a three-time Olympian, having represented her country at the 2012, 2016, and 2020 Olympic Games. She is the 2017 World all-around silver medalist, ma ...

to take the gold, leaving Padurariu with the silver. Additionally she won gold on uneven bars, silver on balance beam behind

Brooklyn Moors Brooklyn Chloe Moors (born February 23, 2001) is a Canadian artistic gymnast who competed at the 2020 Olympic Games. She has also represented Canada at the 2017, 2018, and 2019 World Championships. At the 2017 World Championships she became t ...

, and bronze on floor exercise behind Black and Moors. In June Padurariu was named to the team to compete at the

2019 Pan American Games ; ay, Taqinipuniw anatt’apxtanxa'' , nations participating = 41 , athletes participating = 6,680 , events = 419 in 38 sports , opening ceremony = July 26 , closing ceremony = August 11 , officially opened by = Martín Vizcarra , to ...

alongside Black, Moors,

Shallon Olsen Shallon Jade Olsen (born 10 July 2000) is a Canadian artistic gymnast. She is the 2018 World silver medalist and 2018 Commonwealth Games champion on vault. She is also the 2018 Commonwealth Games floor exercise bronze medalist and the 2019 Pan ...

, and Victoria-Kayen Woo. She later had to pull out after sustaining another fracture to her left foot. On September 4 Padurariu was named to the team to compete at the 2019 World Championships in Stuttgart,

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

alongside Black, Olsen, Moors, and Woo. Due to her injury, Padruariu competed only on bars and beam in the qualification round, where she helped Canada qualify to the team final and individually qualified to the balance beam final. Canada placed seventh overall. In the event finals Padurariu competed on balance beam only but fell on her triple wolf turn. In October Padurariu announced on Instagram that she had verbally committed to attend

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...

on a gymnastics scholarship. A month later she signed her National Letter of Intent with the Bruins, starting in the 2020–21 school year.

2020

In late January it was announced that Padurariu would compete at the Stuttgart World Cup taking place in March. In early February it was announced that she would also compete at the Birmingham World Cup taking place in late March. Her first competition of the season was Elite Canada, where she placed first in the all-around, ahead of

. The Stuttgart World Cup was later canceled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic in Germany The COVID-19 pandemic in Germany has resulted in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths. On 27 January 2020, the first case in Germany was confirmed near Munich, Bavaria. By mid February, the arising cluster of cases had been fully containe ...

as was the Birmingham World Cup due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom.

Competitive history

References

External links

Ana Padurariu
at Gymnastics Canada * {{DEFAULTSORT:Padurariu, Ana 2002 births Living people Canadian female artistic gymnasts Canadian people of Romanian descent Medalists at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships People from Bracebridge, Ontario Sportspeople from Ontario UCLA Bruins women's gymnasts 21st-century Canadian women