Simone Biles was among a number of athletes to slip off the beam in the final (AP)
Simone Biles and teammate Sunisa Lee were among the athletes to tumble off the beam in the final
Simone Biles might have grabbed the headlines, but it was the beam itself that gained the attention, as the finalists went tumbling.
The beam is a precarious apparatus, suspended four feet in the air, and barely wider than a foot, it can cause the undoing of many athletes.
So problematic is the beam that in the team events, a performance cannot be judged until the beam stage is complete, because of the chance of a slip.
But the Olympic final took it to a new level, with four of the eight finalists slipping and at least having to put their hands on the plank to steady themselves, if not tumbling off altogether.
Italian Alica D’Amato claimed the gold medal with a clean routine, even if the difficulty was not especially high, as Biles and her teammate Sunisa Lee fell off the bar.
Biles said afterwards: “The beam final is always the most stressful.
“Usually we have music or background noise, whatever that may be. We do better in environments with noise going on because it feels most like practice.
“People start cheering and then people start shushing gets louder, but then they should be shushed because they’re louder. It was really weird and awkward.
“We’ve asked several times for some music or background noise. I’m not really sure what happened there. Not our favourite, none of us liked it. Yes, it was an odd beam final.”
Retired British gymnast and Eurosport commentator Danusia Francis has offered a reason as to why the beam final was so chaotic.
“The beam is looking terribly slippy today. Maybe they thought these girls are the best in the world [and they made it smaller],” she joked.
“The equipment is Gymnova. My personal preference, as a gymnast, was my least favourite.
“These gymnasts may be training on different brands of equipment. I know in the USA they rarely use Gymnova in training.
“No [they are not standardised], the Gymnova beams are more rounded on the edges, if you’re slightly leaning to one side, it does feel like you slip off compared to the other brands.
“I expected some slips today, but the nerves, the pressure, whatever it might be has got to the finalists.”
Beth Tweddle, who won bronze at London 2012, said on BBC Sport: “We usually say about beam that who stays on wins a medal, and unfortunately that’s the way it’s gone.
“There was a lot of errors in that final. The two Italians went out and did their routines cleanly, and that’s the result.
“The pressure of an Olympic final is so much and you only have to be slightly off line and that’s game over. You cannot pull it back. They were going for some difficult elements out there.”
