Simona Amânar (; born 7 October 1979) is a

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

n former

artistic gymnast Artistic gymnastics is a discipline of gymnastics in which athletes perform short routines on different apparatuses. The sport is governed by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique (FIG), which designs the Code of Points and regulates ...

. She is a seven-time

Olympic Olympic or Olympics may refer to Sports Competitions * Olympic Games, international multi-sport event held since 1896 ** Summer Olympic Games ** Winter Olympic Games * Ancient Olympic Games, ancient multi-sport event held in Olympia, Greece b ...

and ten-time

World Championship A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

medalist. Amânar helped Romania win four consecutive world team titles (1994–1999), as well as the 2000 Olympic team title. She is also the 2000 Olympic all-around champion. She has a vault named after her, one of the most difficult in women's gymnastics, and was inducted into the

International Gymnastics Hall of Fame The International Gymnastics Hall of Fame, located in Oklahoma City, USA, is a hall of fame dedicated to honoring the achievements and contributions of the world's greatest competitors, coaches and authorities in artistic gymnastics. The early IGHO ...

in 2007.

Biography

Simona Amânar is an ethnic Aromanian.

Career

1994–1995

In 1994, her first year on the senior national team, Amânar contributed to Romania's team titles at the

World In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the worl ...

and

European Championships The European Championships is a multi-sport tournament which brings together the existing European Championships of some of the continent's leading sports every four years. The inaugural edition in 2018 was staged by the host cities of Berlin, ...

. Amânar began to excel as an individual performer at the 1995 European Cup, placing second in the all-around behind

Svetlana Khorkina Svetlana Vasilyevna Khorkina (russian: Светлана Васильевна Хоркина; born 19 January 1979) is a retired Russian artistic gymnast. She competed at the 1996 Summer Olympics, the 2000 Summer Olympics, and the 2004 Summer Ol ...

of Russia and winning gold on both

vault Vault may refer to: * Jumping, the act of propelling oneself upwards Architecture * Vault (architecture), an arched form above an enclosed space * Bank vault, a reinforced room or compartment where valuables are stored * Burial vault (enclosure ...

and

floor exercise In gymnastics, the floor is a specially prepared exercise surface, which is considered an apparatus. It is used by both male and female gymnasts. The gymnastics event performed on the floor is called floor exercise. The English abbreviation for t ...

. At the 1995 World Championships, she helped Romania secure its second consecutive world team title and became co-champion on vault (with all-around winner

Lilia Podkopayeva Lilia Oleksandrivna Podkopayeva ( uk, Лілія Олександрівна Подкопаєва; born August 15, 1978) is a Ukrainian former artistic gymnast. She is the 1995 world all-around champion, and the 1996 Olympic all-around and floor e ...

of Ukraine). Amânar's powerful floor routine and vaults put her in the lead after two rotations in the all-around, but she dropped to fourth after an average

uneven bars The uneven bars or asymmetric bars is an artistic gymnastics apparatus. It is made of a steel frame. The bars are made of fiberglass with wood coating, or less commonly wood. The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring is UB or ...

routine and a shaky

balance beam The balance beam is a rectangular artistic gymnastics apparatus and an event performed using the apparatus. Both the apparatus and the event are sometimes simply referred to as "beam". The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring i ...

routine.

1996

Amânar won a silver medal on vault at the 1996 World Championships, behind teammate

Gina Gogean Gina Elena Gogean (born 9 September 1977) is a retired artistic gymnast from Romania who competed internationally in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s. During her career she won an impressive number of 30 medals at Olympic Games, world cha ...

and ahead of Cuba's Annia -Hatch. At the

1996 Summer Olympics The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta, ...

, Amânar was one of the front-runners for several individual medals, but her Olympics started inauspiciously when she fell off the beam during the compulsories. Though she later posted the highest all-around score in the optionals (39.387, her lowest score being a 9.800 on the balance beam), her combined compulsory and optionals scores put her fourth among her teammates, and she did not qualify for the final. However, in a scenario similar to the Unified Team's substitution of

Tatiana Gutsu Tatiana Gutsu, rarely Tetiana Hutsu, ( uk, Тетяна Костянтинівна Ґуцу, ro, Tatiana Guțu; born 5 September 1976, in Odesa, Ukrainian SSR) is a Ukrainian former artistic gymnast from the Soviet Union and the winner of the ...

for

Rozalia Galiyeva Rozaliya Ilfatovna Galiyeva (; born 28 April 1977), also known as Roza Galieva, is a retired artistic gymnast who competed in the 1992 Summer Olympics and 1996 Summer Olympics. Personal life Galiyeva was born on 26 April 1977 ...

at the 1992 Olympics, Amânar replaced her teammate

Alexandra Marinescu Alexandra Marinescu (born 19 March 1982
April 15, 2002 The Romanian head coach,

Octavian Bellu Octavian Ioan Atanase Bellu (; born 17 February 1951) is the current head of the Romanian national women's artistic gymnastics team. He was the main coach, with interruptions, from 1990 to 2005Lavinia Miloşovici, behind Gogean. In both the 1996 Olympic all-around and the 1995 World Championships all-around, Amânar failed to score over 9.800 on the floor exercise despite well-executed and difficult tumbling. In the Olympics, she scored a 9.887 in the team optionals (the highest score of the entire Olympics on any event, for men or women), but only a 9.737 in the all-around. She did not start from a 10.0 in the all-around—despite having the most tumbling bonus points of anyone at the Games—because her tour jeté half-turn (

Strug Strug () is a small settlement on the left bank of the Dravinja River in the Municipality of Makole in northeastern Slovenia. The area is part of the traditional region of Styria. It is now included with the rest of the municipality in the Drava ...

), a C element, was not completed. Thus, she did not have enough simple A, B, and C skills, and much of her D- and E-rated tumbling had to count as easier elements to fulfill those requirements. Amânar did not perform a double turn in the team optionals or the all-around because it was not necessary as long as she completed her Strug. However, when she failed to complete the Strug, four of her six tenths in D and E elements had to count toward requirements, which left her with only .2 counting toward her bonus. Without the error, Amânar would have finished ahead of Gogean and Miloşovici. In the event finals, Amânar completed her Strug and added a double turn to fulfill the more stringent Competition III requirements. She earned a 9.850 and the silver medal, behind Podkopayeva and just ahead of

Dominique Dawes Dominique Margaux Dawes (born November 20, 1976) is a retired American artistic gymnast. Known in the gymnastics community as 'Awesome Dawesome', she was a 10-year member of the U.S. national gymnastics team, the 1994 U.S. all-around senior Nati ...

of the United States. She won the vault final the day before, largely because of her 9.875 score for her double-twisting Yurchenko vault. She left the 1996 Olympics with four medals, including Romania's team bronze.

1997–1999

Romania won its third straight team title at the 1997 World Championships. Amânar again replaced a higher-scoring Marinescu in the all-around competition and won the silver medal behind Russia's Khorkina, followed by a gold medal on vault. In the 1999 World Championships, Amânar led the Romanian team to a fourth consecutive title (there was no Worlds competition in 1998). However, she fell off the bars during the all-around and placed well out of the medals. She also lost her vaulting title to Russia's

Elena Zamolodchikova Elena "Zamo" Mikhailovna Zamolodchikova (russian: Елена Михайловна Замолодчикова; born 19 September 1982) is a Russian former artistic gymnast, and four-time Olympic medallist. In 2015, she was inducted in the Inte ...

, who dominated that event in the following years due to a more difficult second vault: a double-twisting

Tsukahara Mitsuo Tsukahara (塚原光男 ''Tsukahara Mitsuo'', born December 22, 1947) is a Japanese artistic gymnast. He was five times an Olympic Gold Medalist. He remained active in the sport after his retirement from competition. He served as vice ...

. Amânar won her only medal of the competition on the floor, taking home the silver behind teammate

Andreea Răducan Andreea Mădălina Răducan (; born 30 September 1983) is a retired gymnast from Bârlad, Romania. She currently works as a sports announcer and journalist. Răducan began competing in gymnastics at a young age and was training at the Romanian j ...

2000

At the

2000 Summer Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from 1 ...

, the Romanians edged out the Russians to take the team title—their first since

1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast A ...

and their first ever in a non-boycotted Olympics. In the all-around, the vaulting horse was set too low by the Olympic organizers, and the favorite for the title, Svetlana Khorkina, fell on her signature vault. Several other gymnasts fell or stumbled because of the same problem. Many went on to make mistakes on their next event, knowing their medal chances were gone, only to be informed later of the error and their chance to vault again. The three Romanian women either managed to perform well on the faulty vault or vaulted after the mistake had been corrected. They swept the medals, with Răducan winning the gold, Amânar the silver, and

Maria Olaru Maria Olaru (born 4 June 1982)
Maria Olaru is a ...

the bronze. Răducan was subsequently found to have used a cold medicine containing a banned substance. Although her results in other events were allowed to stand, she was stripped of her all-around gold medal, which went to Amânar. Initially, Amânar refused to accept the medal, insisting that Răducan had rightfully earned the title. Olaru took the same stance when the silver was awarded to her. However, they eventually reconsidered and decided to bring the medals home to Romania as symbolic victories of the country. Amânar continued to insist, however, that Răducan was the true Olympic all-around champion. In the event finals, Amânar had the opportunity to defend her Olympic vault title from four years earlier. However, she stumbled badly while debuting a new vault (a 2 twisting laid-out

Yurchenko Yurchenko is a Ukrainian patronymic surname that comes from the name Yuriy. It may refer to: * David Yurchenko (born 1986), Russian-Armenian footballer * Denys Yurchenko (born 1978), Ukrainian pole vaulter * Ihor Yurchenko (born 1960), Soviet a ...

, which was then named after her), and did not win a medal. She went on to win bronze on floor exercise after losing points for a step out of bounds on her last tumbling pass.

Legacy

Amânar ranks highly (117th) on the list of most medal gymnasts in the world, with 10 World and 7 Olympic medals. She played a large role in the four consecutive World team titles and Olympic title that established Romania as the top-ranked women's gymnastics team in the world. The ''

Amanar Yurchenko, also known as round-off entry vaults, are a family of vaults performed in artistic gymnastics in which the gymnast does a round-off onto the springboard and a back handspring onto the horse or vaulting table. The gymnast then perform ...

'' vaultFIG
Women's Artistic Gymnastics Code of Points 2009–2012, page 163 involves a round-off entry onto the vaulting table followed by a laid-out salto with 2 twists. Amânar first competed this skill at the 2000 Olympics. It has a difficulty score of 6.5, 6.3 and 5.8 in the women's 2009–2012, 2013–2016 and 2017–2020 Code of Points.

Post-retirement

Amânar retired in 2000, shortly after the Olympic Games. She married Cosmin Tabără, a lawyer, on 9 March 2002, in

Timișoara ), City of Roses ( ro, Orașul florilor), City of Parks ( ro, Orașul parcurilor) , image_map = Timisoara jud Timis.svg , map_caption = Location in Timiș County , pushpin_map = Romania#Europe , pushpin_ ...

, and gave birth to a son, Alexandru Iosif, five months later. She is the vice president of the

Romanian Gymnastics Federation The Romanian Gymnastics Federation (RGF) is the governing body of gymnastics in Romania. Established in 1906, it supervises gymnastics clubs and gymnasts' participation in international competitions. In 2013, Adrian Stoica was re-elected president ...

Eponymous skill

Amânar has one eponymous skill in the Code of Points, the

vault.

Competitive history

References

External links

Bio at romanian-gymnastics.com

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Amanar, Simona 1979 births Living people Sportspeople from Constanța Aromanian sportspeople Romanian people of Aromanian descent Romanian female artistic gymnasts Olympic gold medalists for Romania Olympic silver medalists for Romania Olympic bronze medalists for Romania Olympic gymnasts of Romania Olympic medalists in gymnastics Gymnasts at the 1996 Summer Olympics Gymnasts at the 2000 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1996 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2000 Summer Olympics World champion gymnasts Medalists at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships European champions in gymnastics Originators of elements in artistic gymnastics Competitors at the 1998 Goodwill Games Goodwill Games medalists in gymnastics