| Balance beam at the Olympic Games | |
|---|---|
 Nadia Comăneci competing on the balance beam at the 1976 Summer Olympics | |
| Overview | |
| Sport | Artistic gymnastics |
| Gender | Women |
| Years held | 1952 – 2024 |
| Reigning champion | |
| Women |  Alice D'Amato (ITA) |
The balance beam is an artistic gymnastics event held at the Summer Olympics on which only women compete. Women started competing in and earning medals at apparatus finals in 1952. [1]
| Rank | Gymnast | Nation | Olympics | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nadia Comăneci |  Romania (ROU) | 1976–1980 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| 2 | Eva Bosáková |  Czechoslovakia (TCH) | 1956–1960 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| Věra Čáslavská | Czechoslovakia (TCH) | 1964–1968 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | |
| Olga Korbut |  Soviet Union (URS) | 1972–1976 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | |
| Shannon Miller |  United States (USA) | 1992–1996 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | |
| 6 | Tamara Manina | Soviet Union (URS) | 1956–1960 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| 7 | Larisa Latynina | Soviet Union (URS) | 1960–1964 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 8 | Simone Biles | United States (USA) | 2016–2020 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| Rank | Nation | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Romania (ROU) | 6 | 0 | 4 | 10 |
| 2 | Soviet Union (URS) | 3 | 8 | 4 | 15 |
| 3 |  China (CHN) | 3 | 4 | 1 | 8 |
| 4 | United States (USA) | 2 | 4 | 5 | 11 |
| 5 | Czechoslovakia (TCH) | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 |
| 6 |  Hungary (HUN) | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Italy (ITA) | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | |
| 8 |  Netherlands (NED) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
 Unified Team (EUN) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
| 10 |  Russia (RUS) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 11 |  Ukraine (UKR) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 12 |  East Germany (GDR) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
The balance beam is a rectangular artistic gymnastics apparatus and an event performed using the apparatus. The apparatus and the event are sometimes simply called "beam". The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring is BB. The balance beam is performed competitively only by female gymnasts.
Cătălina Ponor is a Romanian former artistic gymnast who competed at three Summer Olympic Games: 2004, 2012, and 2016. She won three gold medals at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens on balance beam, floor and as part of the Romanian team. She also earned a silver medal on floor and bronze medal as part of the Romanian team at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, as well as multiple World Championship and European Championship medals. She announced her plans to retire from gymnastics after the 2017 Artistic Gymnastics World Championships, in Montreal. During her career, she won 23 Olympic, World and European medals. More than half of them (12) were gold medals. She was inducted into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame in 2022.
Anastasia "Nastia" Valeryevna Liukin OLY is an American former artistic gymnast. She is the 2008 Olympic all-around champion, a five-time Olympic medalist, the 2005 and 2007 World champion on the balance beam, and the 2005 World champion on the uneven bars. She is also a four-time all-around U.S. national champion, winning twice as a junior and twice as a senior. With nine World Championships medals, seven of them individual, Liukin is tied with Shannon Miller for the third-highest tally of World Championship medals among U.S. gymnasts. Liukin also tied Miller's record as the American gymnast having won the most medals in a single non-boycotted Olympic Games. In October 2011, Liukin announced that she was returning to gymnastics with the hopes of making a second Olympic team. Liukin did not make the 2012 Olympic team and retired from the sport on July 2, 2012.
Rebecca Lauren Downie is a British artistic gymnast who competed at the 2008, 2016, and 2024 Summer Olympics. She is a double European champion and 2014 Commonwealth Games champion on the uneven bars as well as the 2019 World silver medallist.
Lauren Stephanie Mitchell is an Australian former artistic gymnast. She is the 2010 World champion on the floor exercise and the 2009 World Championships silver medalist on the balance beam and floor exercise. Mitchell is only the second Australian female gymnast to win a medal at the World Championships, and she is the first to win a gold medal. She is the 2010 Commonwealth Games champion in the all-around, uneven bars, and balance beam, and with the Australian team, and she is the 2008 World Cup Final balance beam champion. She also represented Australia at the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games.
Kyla Briana Ross is a retired American artistic gymnast and current assistant coach for the Arkansas Razorbacks gymnastics team. She is the first female gymnast to win NCAA, World, and Olympic championship titles.
A perfect 10 is a score of 10.000 for a single routine in artistic gymnastics, which was once thought to be unattainable—particularly at the Olympic Games—under the code of points set by the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG). It is generally recognized that the first person to score a perfect 10 at the Olympic Games was Romanian Nadia Comăneci, at the 1976 Games in Montreal. Other women who accomplished this feat at the Olympics include Nellie Kim, also in 1976, Mary Lou Retton in 1984, Daniela Silivaș and Yelena Shushunova in 1988, Lu Li and Lavinia Miloșovici in 1992. The first man to score a perfect 10 is considered to be Alexander Dityatin, at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.
Aliya Farkhatovna Mustafina is a Russian former artistic gymnast.
Alexandra Rose Raisman is an American retired artistic gymnast and two-time Olympian. She was captain of both the 2012 "Fierce Five" and 2016 "Final Five" U.S. women's Olympic gymnastics teams, which won their respective team competitions.
Elsabeth Ann Black is a Canadian artistic gymnast. She is a four-time Olympian, having represented her country at the 2012, 2016, 2020, and 2024 Olympic games. She is the 2017 World all-around silver medallist, making her the first Canadian gymnast to win a world all-around medal, and she led the Canadian women's gymnastics team to a bronze medal in the 2022 World Championships team final, the first world team medal won by a Canadian gymnastics team. She won a silver medal on the balance beam at the 2022 World Championships. She is also the 2018 Commonwealth Games all-around champion, a two-time Pan American Games all-around champion, and a six-time Canadian national all-around champion. At the 2020 Olympic Games, Black placed fourth in the balance beam final, the highest placement in the Olympics for a female Canadian gymnast.
Simone Arianne Biles Owens is an American artistic gymnast. Her 11 Olympic medals and 30 World Championship medals make her the most decorated gymnast in history, and she is widely considered the greatest gymnast of all time. With 11 Olympic medals, she is the third-most decorated female Olympic gymnast, and has the most Olympic medals earned by a U.S. gymnast.
Rebeca Rodrigues de Andrade is a Brazilian artistic gymnast. Having won a total of 6 Olympic and 9 World medals, she is the most decorated Brazilian and Latin American gymnast of all time, as well as the most decorated Brazilian Olympian in any discipline. In the all-around, she is the 2022 World champion, a two-time Olympic silver medalist, the 2023 World silver medalist, and the 2021 Pan American champion. On vault, she is the 2020 Olympic champion, the 2024 Olympic silver medalist, a two-time World Champion, and the 2023 Pan American Games champion. She led the Brazilian team to its first ever team medals at the 2023 World Championships (silver) and the 2024 Olympics (bronze), as well as the gold medal at the 2021 Pan American Championships. She won the gold medal at the 2024 Olympic in the floor exercise.
Flávia Lopes Saraiva is a Brazilian artistic gymnast. She represented Brazil at the 2014 Summer Youth Olympics in Nanjing, the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio, and the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. She was part of the teams that won silver at the 2023 World Championships, gold at the 2018 South American Games and bronze at the 2015 and 2019 Pan American Games. Individually she is the 2014 Summer Youth Olympic floor exercise champion, the 2023 World Championships floor exercise bronze medalist and is a multi-medalist at the Pan American Games, South American Games, and Pan American Championships.
Margaret Mary Nichols is an American former collegiate artistic gymnast. She was the ninth NCAA gymnast to complete a Gym Slam, the first to do so for Oklahoma, and the first NCAA gymnast to have achieved it twice.
Sanne Wevers is a Dutch artistic gymnast. She is the 2016 Olympic champion on the balance beam and was the first Dutch female gymnast to become an Olympic champion in an individual event. She is the 2018 and 2023 European champion on the balance beam. She is also the 2015 World and 2021 European silver medalist on the balance beam and the 2015 European bronze medalist on the uneven bars. She was a member of the Dutch team that won the bronze medal at the 2018 and 2023 European Championships.
Pauline Sieglinde Schäfer-Betz or Pauline Schäfer is a German artistic gymnast who represented Germany at the 2016, 2020, and 2024 Summer Olympics. She is the 2017 World Champion, the 2021 World silver medalist, and the 2015 World bronze medalist on the balance beam. She was part of the bronze medal-winning German team at the 2022 European Championships.
Alice Nicole Kinsella is an English artistic gymnast and member of the British national gymnastics team. She represented Great Britain at the 2020 Summer Olympics and won a bronze medal in the team event, and was part of the Great Britain team that achieved the highest positions ever achieved in the same event at the 2022 World Championships (silver) and the 2023 European Championships (gold). Kinsella won a Commonwealth Games team title as part of England's gold-winning team all-around squad of 2022.
Jade Ashtyn Carey is an American artistic gymnast. She represented the United States at the 2020 Summer Olympics as an individual, and at the 2024 Summer Olympics as a member of the U.S. women's team nicknamed the "Golden Girls".
The women's balance beam event at the 2020 Summer Olympics was held on 25 July and 3 August 2021 at the Ariake Gymnastics Centre. Approximately 90 gymnasts from 53 nations are expected to compete on the balance beam in the qualifying round.
Kara Eaker is a retired American artistic gymnast. On the balance beam she is the 2018 Pan American and 2019 Pan American Games champion and a two-time United States national silver medalist. On floor exercise she is the 2019 Pan American Games silver medalist and the 2018 Pan American bronze medalist. She was a member of the American teams that won gold at the 2018 and 2019 World Championships, the 2019 Pan American Games, and the 2018 Pan American Championships. She was an alternate for the 2020 Olympic team.
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