46th MEN's ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS EUROPEANS 2024

A medal fight was expected at the 46^th European Men's Gymnastics Championships between the champions of the last two years, Italy and Great Britain, and the Ukrainians, who were leading after the preliminary competition. And indeed, the UKRAINE defended this position and won European team gold for the second time after 2020 in Mersin, having twice failed to reach the final in ninth place - just like the Germans this time. Silver in Rimini went to the 2022 champions (Munich), GREAT BRITAIN, while defending champions ITALY were delighted to take bronze in front of their home crowd.
Turkey followed in second place ahead of Spain, Israel and Cyprus, who had reached a European Championship team final for the first time.

* UKRAINE: Since 2014 the third team medal and after 2020 (Mersin) the 2^nd Team Gold!
                    * ... have also a look to ► ECh-Balances

Switzerland, who finished fourth in the last two years, were disappointed in 8th place ... the German men in ninth place were only spectators for the first time.
Since Wednesday (24 April), 175 athletes from 37 countries have taken to the apparatus (- more: see below).
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At the 26^th Junior European Championships (JEM) (- see below), which took place at the same time, two exceptional athletes ran relatively unchallenged on the final day:
The European junior all-around champion was France's Anthony MANSARD (81.499) ahead of Italy's Tommaso BRUGNAMI (80.832). Bronze went to Gabriel LANGTON (GBR; 79.564). Germany's only medallist Jonas Eder from Ludwigsburg, who had already finished as European vice-champion on parallel bars the day before, made a huge leap forward from 12^th place in the all-around final and finished fourth (79.398), less than -0.2 tenths behind bronze!
Austria's Alfred Schwaiger also achieved a top placing for Austria with 5th place, while the second German junior, Mert Oeztuerk, improved by 2 places to 22^nd.
 The young athletes from France, Italy and Great Britain in particular had already won five of the six individual titles on the apparatus the day before. The German juniors were involved with three final placings on the apparatus: Jonas Eder achieved a ‘German honour’ with silver on parallel bars and competed together with Mert Oeztuerk in the eventing competition today.
The JECh team medals in the national ranking went to Great Britain, Italy and France in that order - Austria came fourth, ahead of Switzerland (!), with Germany in 9^th place.

♦ INDIVIDUAL ALL-AROUND Decision  (- Final standing - without AA final)

Without an individual all-around final, the all-around medals were already awarded in the team qualification this year.
For the first time in the history of the European Championships since 1955, the all-around title went to a gymnast from Cyprus: Marios GEORGIOU: The European high bar champion from Munich 2022 - won his second continental gold medal with 84.265 points and relegated the Ukrainian veteran Oleg VERNIAEV (84.031) to silver by a good two tenths of a point, narrowly missing out on his third European Championship title after 2015 and 2017, even though he seemed to be experiencing his second spring here in Rimini ...!
Yumin ABADINI's bronze medal (83.765) was celebrated by the Italian audience - the first all-around medal for Italy's men in 34 years since Yuri Chechi's bronze medal in 1990!
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♦ Individual All-around  (Final standing)
1. GEORGIOU, Marios  (CYP) - 84,265
2. VERNIAIEV, Oleg       (UKR) - 84,031
3. ABBADINI, Yumin        (ITA) - 83,765
  4. JARMAN, Jake                 (GBR) - 83,431
  5. MESZAROS, Krisztofer    (HUN) - 83,398
  6. KOVTUN, Illia                   (UKR) - 83,331
  7. ABAD, Nestor                  (ESP) - 82,798
  8. DOLGOPYAT, Artem         (ISR) - 82,432
  9. ASIL, Adem                     (TUR) - 82,331
10. GEORGIOU, Ilias             (CYP) - 82,066
      ► Detailed Results

* Final qualifiers on the different apparatus:
► Floor ex.;  ► Pommel h.;  ► S.Rings;  ► Vault;  ► Parallel b.;   ► High b.

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♦ FINALS, part  II:  Saturday, April 27
  V A U L T
1. JARMANN, Jake     (GBR) - (6.0/5.6)=14,883
2. DAVTYAN, Artur      (ARM) - (5.6/5.6)=14,850
3. CHEPURNYI, Nazar (UKR) - (5.6/5.6)=14,749
         8. GIUBELLINI, Luca    (SUI) - (5.6/5.2)=13,516
        ► Detailed Results
           .* Quali: ►Vault

  P A R A L L E L  B A R S
1. KOVTUN, Illia          (UKR) - (6.9)=15,633
2. GEORGIOU, Marios  (CYP) - (6.1)=14,866
3. SEIFERT, Noe            (SUI) - (6.3)=14,833
        ► Detailed Results
                * Quali: ► Parallel bars

  H I G H  B A R
1. KOVTUN, Illia          (UKR) - (5.9)=14,600
2.TVOROGAL, Robert  (LTU) - (5.9)=14,366
3. GEORGIOU, Marios  (CYP) - (5.9)=14,366
         4. SEIFERT, Noe         (SUI) - (6.0)=14,266
        ► Detailed Results
                * Quali:► High bar
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* JECh - TEAM DECISION & Qualification, JUNIORS

♦ Thursday, 25. April - J E Ch (Juniors)
* REVIEW: >> JECh ALL (AA-results since 1978)
- Sub 1: (ISR, SLO, HUN, ROU, ALB, IRE)
- Sub 2: (AZE, SWE, ESP, SUI, ITA, POR, SVK, FRA, MON, ICE, GEO, LUX, GER, CRO, CZE, UKR)
- Sub 3:   (LIT, GRE, GBR, POL, CYP, FIN, AUT, NED, BEL, TUR, ARM, NOR, BUL)
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It was remarkable, but no surprise, that GREAT BRITAIN prevented the local heroes and defending Munich 2022 champions ITALY from winning the junior event in their own hall. After winning silver, FRANCE confirmed its continuous development of young talent with bronze and the Swiss boys slipped down one place to fifth, but the fact that they were ousted by Austria, who finished fourth, is a minor sensation, as they were still in 11th place in 2022! There is evidence of long-term development work being carried out in many areas of Austrian gymnastics!
However, the German boys' loss of rank from 5th place two years ago to 9th place is likely to cause dissatisfaction, which should certainly lead to more in-depth system analyses in Germany. On the other hand, the Ukrainian boys' fall from 7th place to 12th place is understandable, considering the generally difficult and dramatic war situation in this country.
♦   T E A M  RESULTS:
1. GREAT BRITAIN  - 240,258
2. ITALY                  - 240,230
3. FRANCE              - 238,796
       4. AUSTRIA            - 235,563
       5. SWITZERLAND   - 232,993
       6. SPAIN                - 232,062
  7. HUN - 231,995;    8. NED - 231,828;    9. GER - 231,526;
10. ARM - 231,361;  11. BUL - 231,163;   12. UKR - 230,361
     ►  Detailed Results
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♦ J E Ch - Individual All-around, Juniors (Sunday, April 28)

It was a JECh Final in which two athletes ran unchallenged right from the start and Frenchman Anthony MANSARD in particular was able to pull away from his opponent at eye level, but still clearly: For the first time since 1978, the junior gold went to France and after the winner Niccolo Mozzato (2018), Tommaso BRUGNAMI was the second Italian to win an all-around medal in the junior category with silver. Like two years ago, bronze went to Great Britain, this time to Gabriel LANGTON, who moved up from 7th to 3rd place after the Bulgarian David Ivanov, who had been in the leading trio for a long time, fell back to 5th place due to a weak high bar routine!

From a German point of view, the last time Andreas Toba was among the top ten of the continental youngsters was in 2008! Now Jonas EDER from Ludwigsburg achieved this feat again for the first time: He also improved by more than +1.3 points (!) compared to the preliminary competition and catapulted himself from 12th place to fourth place - in sight of bronze, for which he was missing less than 2 ‘tenths’ ...!
Austrian Alfred Schwaiger achieved the best all-around result of an Austrian gymnast at a Junior European Championships to date. The 18-year-old Viennese gymnast finished fifth in the highly competitive final field of the best 24 young European gymnasts in Rimini.
♦   R E S U L T S:
1. MANSARD, Anthony     (FRA) - 81,499
2. BRUGNAMI, Tommaso  (ITA)  - 80,832
3. LANGTON, Gabriel       (GBR) - 79,564
       4. EDER, Jonas               (GER)  - 79,398
       5. SCHWAIGER, Alfred     (AUT)  - 78,931
       6. IVANOV, David              (BUL)  - 78,833
            ►► Detailed Results
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♦ Qualification (Thursday, April 25)
France with Anthony Mansard and Italy with Tommaso Brugnami were the European leaders in the individual competition with over 80 all-around points each. Close behind them were young gymnasts from Bulgaria, Great Britain and also two Austrians, Alfred Schwaiger and Gino Vetter, in 8th and 9th place in the preliminaries, who will also have to be reckoned with in the all-around finals, which, however, will follow their own rules. Whether and to what extent Germany's best gymnast, Jonas Eder, can move up from 12th place will be decided by the form of the day.
While the Swiss boys with Timon Erb (15th) and Janic Faessler (17th) are close behind, Mert Oeztuerk (GER;) has just about made it into the all-around final in 24th place.
* AA results: ► AA-Qualification
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The distribution of the 8 final places for the apparatus decisions also reflects a change in the strength of the three German-speaking gymnastics nations in particular:
 * Germany competes three times, with Elias Jaffer (4th vault), Mert Öztürk (6th rings) and Jonas Eder (5th parallel bars).
 * Austria is on a par in terms of numbers, with Gino Vetter (7th floor), Alfred Schwaiger (6th horse) and Vinzent Lindpointner (5th rings)
 * The Swiss can only hope for Nico Oberholzer in the high bar final (6th).
♦ Qualification results for the apparatus finals (Q):
► Floor ex.;   ► Pommel h.;   ► S.rings;   ► Vault;   ► Parallel b.;   ► High b.
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* J E Ch  - Apparatus Finals, Juniors  (Saturday, April 27)