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While most male gymnasts train for a few routines, Stephen Nedoroscik specializes in one: the pommel horse. And it turned out to be a risk well taken.
The 25-year-old from Massachusetts scored 14.866 on his routine to help his team clinch a bronze medal in Monday's artistic gymnastic finals at the Paris Olympics. It was the team's first medal in men's gymnastics since 2008.
But Nedoroscik leaves the Olympics with more than a medal; he's earned a spot on the internet as the "Pommel Horse Guy."
While waiting almost three hours for his turn on the pommel horse, the last of the six rotations to complete, the bespectacled Nedoroscik lay back with his eyes closed, seemingly in a peaceful nap.
After a long wait, the electric-engineering graduate from Penn State finally worked his moves on the pommel horse in all but 40 seconds. His score put Team USA ahead of Team Great Britain, which came in fourth place, by two points.
The internet responded, as it usually does, with a string of memes.
"Obsessed with this guy on the US men's gymnastics team who's only job is pommel horse, so he just sits there until he's activated like a sleeper agent," one person posted on X.
Obsessed with this guy on the US men's gymnastics team who's only job is pommel horse, so he just sits there until he's activated like a sleeper agent, whips off his glasses like Clark Kent and does a pommel horse routine that helps deliver the team its first medal in 16 years. pic.twitter.com/0D1ZqJjFa1
— Megan ???? (@MegWritesBooks) July 29, 2024
Another X user posted the whole routine. "He's the Clark Kent/Superman of the Olympics, He took off those glasses and brought it home," a comment read.
Obsessed that Stephen Nedoroscik’s only job was the pommel horse and bro COOKED pic.twitter.com/H4Nne8q79W
— Brittany Sdao (@besdao) July 29, 2024
In gymnastics, the pommel horse is known as one of the toughest apparatuses to master. "It's really challenging because you're dealing with so many different balance issues, and constant motion," Randy Jepson, who coached Nedoroscik at Penn State, told USA Today.
But Nedoroscik seemed to have a flair for it. In 2014, a coach who'd trained the national pommel-horse champion the previous year approached Nedoroscik and told him he could be the national champion one day, Time magazine reported.
Nedoroscik went a step further. In 2021, he became the first American to win a gold medal on the pommel horse at the World Championships, according to USA gymnastics.
As the only pommel-horse specialist on the US team, it was on him to complete the team finals and secure the bronze medal.
"Going up to pommel horse, the last guy up in the whole competition, I had a good feeling that our team was in a great spot. I just knew I had to go up there and do my job," he told NBC in an interview after the event.
And landing the dismount, he said, was the "best moment of my life."
