Stories of the Olympic Games: Gymnastics Faster, Higher, Stronger

The Olympic Games of 1976.

14-year-old Nadia Comaneci steps up to the uneven bars

and into history.

You're hoping that not everybody's watching you.

But then when I was on the bars, I realised that they are watching me.

She has just 20 seconds to achieve something never, ever done before.

You're hoping you're not going to make a mistake.

Comaneci performs with beauty and artistry,

but also with a technical perfection.

'Faultless. Absolutely faultless.'

For this, she is awarded

the first ever ten out of ten in Olympic competition.

'A ten has gone on the board. That's perfection.'

I felt great because I knew that's the highest score that you can give.

Even though I didn't feel that was a perfect routine for me.

In my mind, I thought I'd done better in the gym.

The hunger for medals creates in gymnasts an appetite for perfection.

This brings the pleasure of winning...

but also the pain of defeat.

I had the biggest mistake of my life.

'And she's lost it. There, the gold medal, I'm certain, has gone.'

I didn't feel anything because I was shocked.

'She has had a disaster.'

It leads gymnasts to embrace ever-increasing danger,

adding new twists, turns and somersaults

to already daring routines.

'A back somersault and a twist and a perfect ending.'

It fires their ambition, makes gymnasts push their bodies

to unbelievable extremes.

My knee then completely dislocated with a loud crack.

And their desire for glory has made gymnastics at the Olympics

a restless search for greater and greater perfection.

This is the story of that quest.

'A ten. She's got another ten.'

What exactly is the end of perfection? Where do you grab it?

There is no end.

'It is quite incredible.'

'That's perfection.'

'November 22nd, 1956.

'105,000 people take their allotted places

'in the stands.

'Temperature already near the 80s

'at this, the commencement of the greatest show on earth.'

CHEERING

MARCHING BAND PLAYS

The Melbourne Games of 1956.

Until the 1950s, gymnastics at the Olympics

had been pretty much a man's sport.

For the women, it had all been a bit girly.

For the ladies, there were team events of little physical challenge.

'Each team, consisting of six highly trained athletes,

'gave a breathtaking display

'which completely fired the enthusiasm of Melbourne audiences.'

Now, that would change.

'Women's gymnastics pre-exercise.'

Melbourne was only the second games

where women had been allowed to compete for individual medals.

But here was a new beginning, a chance for women gymnasts

to develop a sport they could own and define.

'But now, all eyes are on Russian Larissa Latynina.

'Her previous two medals were silver...'

One of the pioneers of this new gymnastics,

and its first star, was 22,

and at her first Olympics in Melbourne.

Larissa Latynina of the Soviet Union.

INTERPRETER: The Olympics in Melbourne were my first games.

Naturally, nobody had set any objectives for me to achieve.

'Larissa Latynina of Russia.

'Here is one of the world's great women gymnasts in action.

'Never a falter, every movement timed and precise.'

On the floor, the lessons of ballet and choreography were the key

to Latynina transforming what had been for the men an athletic act

into 90 seconds of feminine artistry.

I think the event I enjoyed the most was the floor exercise.

I always felt that the floor allowed women gymnasts

to rotate and jump and present themselves artistically,

like a ballet dancer.

Sometimes, I even felt as if I was a bird doing my leaps.

It was incredible.

In the all-round competition, Larissa mastered two disciplines

created specially for women competitors.

First, the uneven bars, adjusted to an asymmetrical design

from the parallel bars of the men.

'Never a falter. Every movement timed and precise.'

Then the beam...

..where there is only four inches of wood to balance on.

This was introduced by the sport's governing body

to give new physicality to the women's competition.

Introducing the beam, there was nothing like it

that had ever been seen before.

That's what set women's gymnastics apart.

It was graceful, it needed poise, balance, elegance,

and the fact it was all done on a four-inch-wide beam was fascinating.

Hard to imagine a man on the beam.

To perform well on the beam,

you need to have a very strong sense of balance.

And the experience of choreography.

In Melbourne, Larissa won the prestigious all-round competition,

plus three other gold medals.

She just carried that message that this is a sport for women.

And that was her great gift.

And a lot of people regarded her then as the first superstar in the sport.

Then, at the 1960 Games in Rome, with Soviet gymnasts dominating,

Larissa repeated her success.

Her pioneering gymnastics won what is still a historic number of medals

for a female competitor at the Olympics.

There was no question she could claim to be

the first queen of gymnastics.

Larissa's swansong came at the 1964 Games in Tokyo.

Here, she competed against a Czech gymnast

who, from the very beginning, had an ambition to depose the Red Queen.

INTERPRETER: I had a photo of Larissa Latynina

in my training notebook.

I can never forget that.

And I used to say to myself, "I will get you one day."

Caslavska fascinated spectators

by the contrast she made with the all-powerful Soviets.

We were used to seeing the unstoppable,

unshakeable Soviet females.

And they had this aura about them. They weren't quite human.

What Vera brought was a freshness to the way the sport was carried out.

But what Vera was bringing to the competition

was more than brilliant technique and virtuosity.

She introduced new feeling and emotion to gymnastics.

And for the first time, Vera brought an alluring,

even sexy presence to the women's competition.

Visually, you'd be like someone you took to your high school prom.

She had her hair up in a big bouffant and a very womanly body.

But she was an amazing competitor and she was very smart.

When it came to competition on the floor, a black and white age

gave way to something much more colourful.

By this time, she was already doing

much more modern and complex routines.

This is typical of all younger people.

They are always a few steps ahead of those defending their title.

Charisma plus talent allowed Vera to win gold in the all-round event,

on the beam,

and the vault.

By the end of the Tokyo Games,

Caslavska had been crowned the new queen.

After Tokyo, and in the build-up to the Mexico City Games of 1968,

Caslavska was clear favourite to retain her crown.

But that turbulent year changed Caslavska's motives

for competing against the Soviet Union.

Something had happened to give her gymnastics

a different kind of eloquence.

Dubcek! Svoboda! Dubcek! Svoboda!

Vera Caslavska had always been a supporter of Alexander Dubcek,

and his attempt to bring

greater freedoms and democracy to Czechoslovakia.

She was then a witness

to the invasion of her country by Soviet Bloc tanks.

Then the tanks arrived.

It was a shock.

Nobody could believe it.

As a signatory to a celebrated manifesto calling for change,

Caslavska was forced into hiding.

The forests of Moravia became her improvised training camp.

A tree that had fallen became my beam.

I practised the run-up to the vault on a forest bath.

I turned the forest into a gym

and was preparing myself without any apparatus.

It was only weeks before the 1968 Games that Vera was allowed

to travel to Mexico City.

There, she found that because of the invasion,

the Czech team had the support of the Mexicans.

When the team entered the Champions Gate,

with a placard saying "Czechoslovakia",

the whole stadium was on its feet and started singing.

Czecho, Czecho, ra-ra-ra!

Czecho, Czecho, Czecho!

This gave us such a boost.

The whole world would now live through this with us.

'Here is Vera Caslavska,

'on the beam.

'Exercise in which she is absolutely superb.'

In Mexico City, Caslavska completely dominated the women's competition.

'A back somersault and a twist and a perfect ending.

'And now, on the vault.

'On, over and a perfect stance.

'Oh, it's absolutely superb

'the way she went from the top bar to the bottom.

'Everyone in the audience gasped.

'And she's away. A tremendous roar.

'Well, I cannot see Vera Caslavska being beaten.'

By her last event, Vera had already accumulated

three golds and two silver medals.

Everyone surrounding the great champion.

She was to end her competition with a final floor exercise.

MUSIC: "Jarabe Tapatio" by Jesus Gonzales Rubio

To the delight of the Auditorio Municipal,

the performance she now gave was pure crowd pleaser.

'Oh, that must be the Mexican Hat Dance and the crowd are roaring.

'What a superb gymnast this girl is.'

I had watched the Mexican dancers and their moves.

I realised I had to shake my shoulders

and flirt with the crowd the same way.

Vera took the floor exercise and she took it to the audience.

She lived every gesture, every note of music was choreographed.

She took it to a new level.

'That was Caslavska at her best.'

I enjoyed that so much.

It was fun and passionate, just like the Mexican temperament.

'She's not going to give this Olympic gold medal up without a fight.'

But the prospect of yet more Czech gold was allegedly too much

for a judging panel where the Soviet Union could throw its weight around.

There's no doubt that a lot of chicanery went on.

The Eastern Bloc nations, when they got together,

under the influence of the Soviets, could bend the judging rules.

Despite the Czech belief that Vera had won outright,

it was decided that Caslavska should share the gold medal.

So she stood side-by-side with the Soviet Larissa Petrik.

I think Vera was quite right to feel aggrieved

that she didn't win that gold in her own right.

Following the Czech anthem, the Soviets' was played.

At this point, something happened.

TRANSLATION: When the Soviet anthem started playing,

I turned my back on the flag and lowered my head.

She picked a very elegant, but very distinct way, to express herself.

She made her point, but in a very intellectual, and a very subtle,

but yet a very strong way.

This was not planned. It came from within, from my soul,

from my heart.

Vera returned home a heroine to the Czech people

but an enemy of the state.

As soon as the public acclaim died down, she was punished.

I had been on the winner's podium

and issued my protest against the invasion.

They didn't like that at all.

I was a thorn in their side.

So they punished me. I couldn't find a job.

I was out of work for five years.

They stopped me from travelling abroad.

Their aim was for me to be forgotten.

The courageous Czech had won seven gold

and four silver medals for her country.

Vera left behind many admirers.

In Mexico City, one was a fellow competitor,

a young Japanese gymnast.

Sawao Kato was 22 at his first Games in 1968,

and destined to become a champion in his own right.

TRANSLATION: Her performance was fantastic,

elegant, rhythmical and mature.

I watched her avidly.

I took photographs of her.

Even though I know her well, she has no idea who I am.

Kato was part of a Japanese team bringing to the men's competition

the artistry that women like Latynina and Caslavska

has charmed earlier Games with.

They were the most artistic gymnasts I had ever seen.

For the Japanese gymnasts,

it wasn't just about the skills and the acrobatic.

It was about creating a beautiful performance.

And I really admired them for that

and that was really the type of athlete I wanted to try to be.

For the Japanese, each gymnastic move has its own line of beauty.

They wanted to show the world their artistic interpretation of

what everybody else was doing.

Everybody else was doing the minimum

and they're showing this incredibly artistic performance.

There was another Japanese quality to go with their performance art - fierce commitment.

This created strength of mind to compete in the most difficult circumstances.

Coming into the 1968 Games, Sawao Kato had been ill.

In Japan, I had been on a training camp that summer.

It was hot like today and I became ill.

I couldn't keep water down and I lost a lot of weight.

COMMENTATOR: And the green light signifies the entry onto the floor

of Sawao Kato of Japan.

But adversity simply became the spur to competition.

In the all-round event, Kato conquered all six men's disciplines.

This included the rings, the ultimate test of strength

for a male gymnast.

A fine handstand on those rings.

Here, Kato San wanted to emulate

the achievements of the Soviet great, Albert Azaryan.

There used to be a gymnast called Azaryan.

He would rise up slowly like this, then go up into the crucifix.

Forward circle into the crucifix.

The crucifix is the hardest of a hard challenge.

It takes a lot of strength, enormous amount of strength.

It's a lot of leverage on your shoulders,

a lot of pressure on your shoulders.

In fact, you can see here that

I've torn that bicep completely off, doing it.

And I tore that bicep off doing it, too.

So people ask me, "Is it hard?" and I'm like, "Yep."

Despite his illness, Kato won the all-round title

in Mexico City and two other gold medals.

Here, and in Games that followed,

Kato was confirmed as a great Olympic champion.

Sawao Kato - a very, very popular champion indeed.

But there was something more to the Japanese than the satisfaction of the medal haul.

They had a gymnastics culture, with the spirit and technique

to push the boundaries of their sport.

The Japanese invented moves of ever-greater difficulty.

Such as on the vault.

Here, there is 25 metres of sprinting.

You hit the board hard, then launch yourself.

It's the most explosive event in gymnastics.

Japanese gymnast Mitsuo Tsukahara introduced a whole new dimension

to gymnastics when he brought new daring to this discipline.

Prior to the Tsukahara vault, every vault in gymnastics involved

one single somersaulting rotation.

It was a handspring over the vault,

or the great Japanese gymnast prior to that

was a gentleman named Yamashita, who would handspring

and kind of pike up in the air and land.

It was really just one single revolution.

When Tsukahara came along, he did what is called a half turn onto the horse

and he pushed off and did an additional backflip.

And it was risky. Now there's two somersaults involved.

That revolutionised vaulting because it was the first

multiple-flipping vault that any gymnast had ever done.

For over a decade,

the Japanese had been showing the way ahead for Olympic gymnastics.

Their greater daring earned them more points

and higher scores guaranteed medals.

In this, the once-dominant Soviet Union

was falling behind by the early '70s.

But it did respond to the challenge of greater technical difficulty.

In one gym, in Grodno, Belarus,

revolution was allowed to be plotted.

Here, a very different kind of gymnast was hard at work.

Young, only 17,

small at 4'11",

and weighing barely six stone.

Her name was Olga Korbut.

Gymnastics, I think, is a very, very hard sport

because you not just have to practice,

you have to do diet and give up everything,

just for gymnastics,

to be a Olympic champion.

Korbut and coach Renald Knysh were inventing moves with a danger that,

until now, had only been contemplated by men.

They worked endlessly on

the first-ever backward somersault on the beam.

Back vault - I was the first,

and you have to just practice every day.

I just started doing the floor, then on the bench,

and then little beam, and higher, higher, higher.

You have to prepare it very good. Slowly, step-by-step, very patient.

When the 1972 Games began in Munich,

there was excitement about the potential of this Soviet teenager.

Millions were watching on prime-time TV,

for the first time in colour,

as Korbut made her debut during the all-around competition.

By the uneven bars, she was in third place

after completing the vault and the floor exercise.

Then there was an extraordinary moment, a very public nightmare,

that would make Korbut a household name.

And this is the girl who, so far,

has captured this audience and enchanted us all.

I had the biggest mistake in my life.

This the apparatus she totally excels at.

Except for that disastrous start.

I didn't feel anything because I was shocked.

Cos this is element.

You can do it. Everybody can do it.

I didn't remember anything.

And it was crushing to everybody because everybody had told

all of their friends who hadn't seen it, "Watch now,"

and then you see this disaster, you know.

There is an absolute buzz...

And another disaster.

And she's lost it!

There, the gold medal,

I'm certain, has gone.

This girl who had everybody talking about her,

17 years of age, she brought a new dimension to this event.

'When I finished, I just thought this was a dream.'

She has had a disaster.

Her reaction to defeat was not what was expected from a Soviet gymnast.

What can one say?

It gave us a chance to see a Russian who could break down and cry,

and not have that strong, Soviet front up all the time.

It's like, "She's human!

My God, she made a mistake and she cried. Isn't that wonderful?!"

But Korbut had the mental strength to recover and concentrate on

competing for medals in the individual categories.

This...is a most vital one minute 20 seconds for Olga Korbut.

On the beam, you're nervous all the time,

because it's so thin and you concentrate.

Because this is most dangerous event.

On the beam, Korbut revealed

the stunning move she had been perfecting in training.

You have to love, believe...

..and you will do it.

Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic!

It was here that the world understood that what they

were watching was the beginning of a new era for gymnastics.

There is no doubt that this girl

is one of the greatest things to hit gymnastics in this modern era.

Her stuff was daring.

It was like hanging it out there, like no-one would do.

Caslavska did beautiful gymnastics

but you never felt she could hurt herself,

or she would do anything that would, you know, everybody would go...

HE GASPS

Worst thing she could do, she might fall off the beam, but so what?

That's a mistake but it's not a catastrophe.

Olga did stuff that you worried about her health.

You thought, "Oh my God! How could she do that?

"How could she risk that?"

Korbut finished her competition with the floor exercise.

If she gets 9.9 for this exercise,

she will win the floor exercises.

And she is so vivacious,

has got so much confidence,

that she might just do that.

Here, she put on a show of impish charm and childlike delight

in her gestures, jumps and somersaults.

I just felt like I was seven years old

and I dancing just on the grass outside.

This is what I felt.

Ha-ha! Oh, that was terrific!

How can you take it away from this girl?

Isn't she marvellous?

Olga Korbut has caused so many sensations here this evening.

And she's done it! She's done it.

9.9 - Olga Korbut wins the gold medal in the floor exercises.

What a remarkable performance!

Somebody have to do revolution to change gymnastics.

I broke the system.

Munich had made Korbut gymnastics' first-ever celebrity,

and in the four long years till the next Games,

the Soviet authorities exploited this ruthlessly.

I was very hot and popular in the world. Everybody want a piece of me.

For four years, I didn't have even a week to be in my home town.

Month before the Olympic Games,

I did something special for the government.

I flew to Germany, I think,

for some kind of very rich party.

You couldn't do it before Olympic Games like that.

This is why I was very tired.

From everything.

From gymnastics, even.

So, by the time she arrived at the 1976 Games in Montreal,

Olga Korbut was washed up.

The Soviet women's team in Montreal did include other great gymnasts.

Nellie Kim.

And there was Ludmila Tourischeva who, in Munich,

had won the all-round title in 1972.

So Tourischeva could claim to be the queen of gymnastics.

Yet, with her style and size,

she represented the past, rather than the future.

In Montreal,

the future came in the shape of a team of teenagers from Romania.

And they rattled the Soviets.

I remember they showed us

a lot of explosion from Romanian gymnastics.

And I didn't understand why they did it. They scared us.

This is no way to do it before a competition.

The coach of the Romanian team knew that he had one gymnast

with the ability and temperament to defeat the Soviets.

Nadia was a fearless kind.

Fearless because she was so very prepared that,

whenever she went in, she always went in with 100% confidence.

I never seen anything that would indicate to me that

she has any concern about performing one of those difficult skills.

COMANECI: I was 14 and a half.

We knew from the TV coverage and the press that we are competing

against the USSR,

the Russian imperium.

We knew that we were always the underdog.

Adrenaline is going because you can't wait to get in and start to compete.

The waiting...is the hardest period of time.

During the team competition, Nadia Comaneci stepped up

to perform on the uneven bars.

There was a lot of movement.

But when she walked up and took the nod from the judges,

there was, like, an absolute silence.

And as she got further into the exercise,

you felt this rush in your body, like, "Oh!"

Cos she did everything right to the limit.

You think, "Oh, she could go over... No, she won't!"

And I can hear when they were...

SHE INHALES

Yeah, I could hear that!

Because it was quiet in the arena.

Some people thought that this is not possible to be done.

I was doing it with such ease.

They couldn't believe that somebody who was 14 years old could do it.

Faultless. Absolutely faultless.

Nadia Comaneci.

Now, what are the judges going to say about that?

She comes down, the crowd is cheering, the crowd is up

and I am looking over there because I heard the crowd go, "Oooh!"

And I'm looking up at the scoreboard and it comes out 1.0!

I said, "Gosh, that's a killer!

"That's a killer."

And I turn my head and I saw the scoreboard coming around,

and it was a 1.00.

I said, "Just wait, just wait. I am finding out."

I could see on her eye, asking, "What is this?"

I said, "Just a second, I'll find out."

So I'm going toward the judges and I'm pushing the people through.

I wanted to get there and I said, "What in world is going on?"

I never got to the jury stand because halfway between me and the jury stand,

the announcer comes in and says,

"Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time ever in the history of the sport, a perfect ten!"

Wow!

A ten has gone on the board.

That's perfection and that is

Olympic history for Nadia Comaneci.

Ten dead.

I felt great because I knew that's the highest score that you can give,

even though I didn't feel that was the perfect routine for me.

In my mind, I thought I'd done better in the gym.

That's her comeback.

In the days after this first perfect ten,

Nadia Comaneci realised perfection

on an astonishing six other occasions,

leading to three gold medals.

Ten, she's got!

She takes it again for the fourth time.

There were three more tens on the uneven bars,

then another three on the beam.

On the beam, Comaneci's performances were of such nerveless technique

that they gave an impression of faultless control.

Sometimes it goes so slow for you,

even though the routine is pretty fast.

You just go piece by piece, second by second.

This skill, the next skill.

The key to Nadia's genius was that she could make

the quick mental calculations and physical corrections needed

to achieve perfection.

When I take off, I already know what the end result is.

Sometimes I felt that I'm off because I took off a little to the side,

so I have to make very quick correction in the air,

which is like either shoulder or my head turns the other way,

but you can't see that.

So it's tricky!

What she brought through the door,

the athletic and acrobatic skills and the death-defying stuff,

but she was technically perfect.

I mean, really, if you look at her gymnastics,

the body position, everything...

Someone who's a specialist in body movement, they'd go,

"That's exactly how that move should be done. That's exactly how that move..."

and so what she did is she took from Olga the torch and said,

"Do whatever you want," and then she did it perfectly.

Have you ever seen anyone more confident on a four-inch beam?

She's got it again!

Twice in succession on the beam,

the most difficult piece of apparatus that the girls work.

In Montreal, there was the pleasure of watching Comaneci,

but you could also witness the pain a gymnast would endure to win gold.

To this day, my palms get sweaty just thinking about it.

In 1976, Japan was looking for its fifth successive team gold

against their greatest rivals, the Soviets.

Andrianov gets a high score.

Now the turn of Sawao Kato of Japan on parallel bars.

During the competition,

the Japanese fell behind and were looking at defeat.

TRANSLATION: Before the competition, we lost our star.

A late substitute came in.

All of us knew the team was in trouble but you just can't say,

"I wonder if we will lose."

Now their formidable group ethic came into play.

It fell to late replacement Shun Fujimoto

to help his team-mates rescue the situation.

First, on the floor.

TRANSLATION: On the final landing on the floor, I injured my knee.

We heard a snapping sound down below.

I was shocked.

Although he had broken his knee,

Fujimoto continued on the pommel horse.

With the pommel horse, I just wanted to run away.

I wanted to run away. I was shaking.

Once you have jumped up, you don't need your legs for support,

so he managed it.

I got a 9.5.

So I somehow managed to come out on top on the pommel horse.

Next were the rings, and the inevitable landing

on Fujimoto's shattered knee.

We had no idea that Fujimoto was injured

when he approached the rings.

Every swing was precise, beautiful combinations.

I forgot that I needed to be sensible in that final moon salto.

There was no impression at all that anything was amiss,

until he hit the deck.

My knee then completely dislocated with a loud crack.

You just saw a grimace on his face

and then finally he gave in to the pain.

And to produce the highest score ever in his career, 9.7 on rings,

I mean, the mental focus...

How he could divorce mentally

from the physical pain he must have been suffering...

Well, it's almost samurai in nature.

Fujimoto's bravery and self-sacrifice tipped the balance of the competition.

Japan narrowly won gold.

Nowadays, I only have the lateral ligament.

I don't have the medial, anterior or the posterior cruciate ligament.

None of those three.

Often in lessons, when I get up from kneeling, my knee pops out,

even now.

After the glories of Montreal, the next Games in Moscow

would be very different.

In 1980, Nadia Comaneci was four years older, a mature gymnast.

There were a couple of pressures on me because I understood

what people expect from me because I was the Olympic champion.

And I was in a country where our biggest competitors were.

But in these Games, Nadia would prove to be fallible.

Her greatest rival in Moscow would be a Soviet,

the unfancied Yelena Davydova.

Comaneci still to come.

During the competition,

Comaneci made an early mistake on the uneven bars,

like Korbut eight years earlier.

This would surely end her medal prospects.

"Oh! OK. So now she fell.

"Now we all have chances to grab that medal."

But she then performed so brilliantly that, by the last event,

she was in second place, just behind Davydova.

The tension here is unbearable.

The last challenge was the beam,

the discipline she considered the most difficult,

but the one on which she scored three perfect tens in Montreal.

Somebody whistled when she took off.

Comaneci now needed a big score to win the gold medal.

It was my last event and everybody,

they kind of knew how much I needed to get,

if I was going to win this or I am going to be second.

9.9, remember - only good enough for silver.

Well, it was a fine performance.

Whatever the score, it may not be enough,

but it's a delight to see her back.

That was a 9.95 routine.

She hits the ground, one score comes up nine and this person comes 9.85.

I said, "Wait a second. What's going on here? What's going on?"

Karolyi waits. Nadia waits.

And then starts the discussion inside the judging conference.

So I'm moving closer, even though I shouldn't do that,

but I moved closer because I wanted to hear what was going on.

Karolyi at the back there and a little bit of gamesmanship there.

They've put Davydova on the podium.

So, 28 minutes the competition stopped, to figure out my score.

CROWD WHISTLES

And whistles all around.

-CROWD CHEERS

-9.85.

With that, the gold goes to Yelena Davydova.

9.85. Devastating.

Bela Karolyi is not convinced.

Her coach still believes that an alleged conspiracy took place to deny Comaneci gold.

That was, that was the time when I said,

"That is a open highway robbery. That's highway robbery."

And the bronze to Nadia Comaneci.

Was this another compromise, as with Vera Caslavska in Mexico City?

I will never say there was a conspiracy.

The only thing I will say is that I opened the door

because I made a mistake.

Because if I wouldn't make a mistake, there was no way they could touch me.

In the early '90s, the world changed

and Eastern Bloc domination of gymnastics ended.

Gyms behind the former Iron Curtain closed

as the money dried up and coaches went to work abroad.

However, by the Barcelona Games, another country was competing who,

until the mid-80s, had never won a single gold medal at the Olympics.

Here, in 1992, the Chinese confirmed their arrival

with an extraordinary display of daring and invention.

During his floor exercise, Li Xiaoshuang attempted

the first ever backwards triple somersault at an Olympics.

Is he going to do a triple somersault?

TRANSLATION: It was the most difficult move in the whole exercise.

It's called the triple back tuck somersault.

The chance of failure is very high. You might get hurt.

Yes, is the answer.

The fact that he did a triple, in competition, was amazing.

That is an iconic moment.

It hasn't been done since in an Olympic floor final.

With his perfect execution, Li won gold

and a gymnast like Li proved that,

in so many ways, China was the coming power.

If they watch me, they will think...

IN ENGLISH: "My God! Chinese! Chinese!"

When the Games came to Beijing in 2008,

the Chinese men faced the pressures of competing at home.

Full twisting double to finish. That was fantastic.

The big, big dismount.

Ho-ho ho! Surely the gold is in the bag for China.

Triple twist. Thank you very much.

But they performed with bravery and skill to prove that they, too,

welcomed the challenge

of greater and greater difficulty on the apparatus.

If he nails this...

Brilliant routine! Brilliant!

TRANSLATION: Because I do so many different moves,

my competitors feel threatened, so they can't beat me.

A phenomenal routine!

I am pursuing domination.

I was born to be number one.

And so onto the next Games and the next generation.

They, too, must satisfy the most demanding of standards

to pursue perfection and win gold in London.

It has to do with their heart,

their energy, their desire to be perfect

and, more importantly, to be more perfect, and more difficult,

than the person standing next to them.

And the striving for that, that's what makes our sport exciting to me.

Big wind-up. Go on! Yesss!

That was fantastic!

The current world champion is Kohei Uchimura.

He looks to the Japanese masters of the past for inspiration

and they, in turn, recognise his greatness.

He does things we couldn't imitate.

They didn't even exist in my day.

And he does them so well.

In a Tokyo gym,

the latest technology aids Kohei in his search for glory.

But Uchimura knows that to win gold,

he must look inside for something more timeless,

and this will take him further in his quest.

TRANSLATION: I do wonder how I can do it even better.

I am never satisfied with my performance.

I always have an eye on the road ahead of me.

In their training camp, a revived Russian women's team

works long hours for cherished medals.

Who here will be the next queen of Olympic gymnastics

to follow the majesty of greats like of Latynina...

Caslavska...

or Comaneci?

They believe they have amongst them a gymnast who might become

the once and future queen.

There comes a gymnast from Russia,

name of Mustafina,

which is so complete and so good at all four events,

and being so much different.

If Mustafina or any other gymnast desires to match the achievements

of the Olympic greats, they must aim as high as possible.

But history dictates they go much further, to a higher place,

beyond the perfection of those who have gone before.

And ten has gone on the board.

That's perfection.

Going to that, let's say, scale of perfection,

once you get there, then somebody else comes next to you.

Then you have to go higher.

So what exactly is the end of perfection?

Where do you grab it? There is no end.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd