Zhang Boheng

The Chinese team at the Asian Games in Hangzhou kept their gold streak going, as Zhang Boheng won the men’s all-around title on Tuesday, and then Zuo Tong took the women’s all-around title the next afternoon.

Zhang was at his all-time best here, earning an 89.299 to win the gold by more than two points with the highest score we’ve seen in men’s gymnastics since the 2016 quad, where scores were higher across the board in a code of points that allowed for greater levels of difficulty. His highest scores came on parallel bars and high bar, where he earned seemingly impossible scores of 15.466 and 15.2 for brilliant performances on both, and his lowest score was a 14.5 on floor, a score most gymnasts would dream of on any event.

His performance and scores here have fans begging for him to be put on a plane and sent to worlds, and I have to say I’m fully on board for this plan, but I also understand why China wanted him to have this glory at home. It’s definitely not the same as going head-to-head once again with the other best gymnasts in the world, and I think most athletes would value a world title over a continental one, but for China, this competition was truly everything, and Zhang more than delivered on their expectations for him.

It was pretty clear Zhang was going to be the star of this show and he’s of course the biggest story of this particular final, but it was also thrilling to see Japan’s Kitazono Takeru take the silver medal with a performance that trumps pretty much any of the work he’s done in his career.

Kitazono was the most promising young Japanese athlete going into the Tokyo Games, and he ended up making the team at just 18 years old, winning a silver medal with his team. But some regression across his all-around program coupled with a lack of consistency has held him back since then, leaving him out of contention for the worlds teams both last year and this year. Don’t get me wrong, he was still in pretty excellent shape and could regularly score in the 83-85 range, but on a team with so much all-around depth, he hasn’t been able to contend with the guys who are consistently just a little bit better.

But with his performance here earning an 87.032, Kitazono is now officially the second-best Japanese all-arounder this year behind Hashimoto Daiki, and showed exactly what he’s capable of when everything clicks. He was able to capitalize on his highest-difficulty events, earning a 14.433 on high bar, a 14.6 on pommel horse, and a 15.3 on parallel bars while also putting in solid work everywhere else to show why he could very well be in Olympic contention again next year.

Rounding out the podium was Lan Xingyu of China, who earned an 84.965 to take the bronze, bolstered by a 15.266 for rings, his pet apparatus. Lan is also a strong vaulter, earning a 14.5, and his parallel bars routine earned a 14.533. Everything else is a bit further behind in difficulty, but with clean performances throughout, he was able to stay afloat to defeat Kawakami Shohei, one of the all-around podium favorites here who unfortunately counted falls on pommel horse and vault to fall back to fourth place with an 81.832.

Also reaching the top eight here were Bae Garam of South Korea in fifth with a 77.865, Asadbek Azamov of Uzbekistan in sixth with a 77.197, Mohammadreza Khosronezhad of Iran in seventh with a 76.730, and Ravshan Kamiljanov of Uzbekistan in eighth with a 76.665.

In the women’s competition, Zuo earned a 53.565 to win the gold medal, which ended up being the first all-around medal of her elite career with a score that was a personal best.

Zuo, who turned 17 earlier this month, only just made her international debut at the Asian Championships in June, where she competed two events in qualifications and went on to win the bronze on bars, but domestically she hasn’t been much of a standout until this year. It was great to see her put together a solid and complete performance, relying on her strongest events – bars and beam – for the bulk of her score, but also showing hits on her weaker events to come out with an impressive and unexpected win.

Okamura Mana of Japan won the silver medal with a 52.898, doing some of her best work on beam to earn a 13.933 – a nice bump up from her qualifications score – while also hitting vault, bars, and floor, though she did have some struggles on the first two. Like Zuo, this is the first all-around medal of her senior elite career, and in only her second senior assignment after having made her debut with the gold on beam at Cottbus in February, so it was great to see her stand out and shine without the top Japanese all-arounders in the mix.

The bronze medal went to Kim Su Jong of North Korea, who earned a 51.466 to earn that last spot on the podium. It wasn’t a great day for Kim, who hit beam for a 13.2, but otherwise struggled, scoring far below her potential. But it was a better day than some of the other contenders, including Zhang Jin, who led the field in qualifications but ultimately dropped significantly due to a fall on vault and three falls on bars.

It was heartbreaking to see Zhang not live up to the potential she showed the other night, but at the same time it was so fulfilling to watch Kim reach the podium after such a tumultuous start to her career after being forced to give up her Olympic spot when North Korea withdrew from the Tokyo Games due to concerns about the Covid-19 pandemic.

The other top finishers here included Ting Hua-Tien of Taiwan in fifth with a 50.299, An Chang Ok of North Korea in sixth with a 50.299, Lim Sumin of South Korea in seventh with a 49.166, and her teammate An Yeonjeong in eighth with a 48.965.

Unfortunately, one of the top medal contenders, Ushioku Kohane of Japan, was forced to sit out the competition after being injured on vault just before it was set to begin, leaving Japan with just one all-arounder in the field as there wasn’t enough time to replace her. Ushioku had a fantastic performance in qualifications and was looking likely to pick up a couple of individual medals between the all-around competition as well as with how she was looking going into the vault and floor finals, especially after qualifying into floor with the top score, so this was an incredibly unfortunate end to her meet, and we hope she can get well soon and come back stronger next year.

Article by Lauren Hopkins