What makes a champion? Are they born? Are they made? Are they the product of eating Wheaties for breakfast? Or is their eventual victory predetermined by the city they were born in, especially if that city is the butt of a beloved, regional joke? Stephen Nedoroscik, Team USA's pommel horse hero, has emerged as one of the first viral sensations of the Paris 2024 Olympics, capturing social media's heart with his glasses, his Clark Kent transformation, his naps and/or meditations, his Rubik's cube skills, and the fact that his only event is pommel horse. Gymnasts usually need to be great at a few events in order to qualify for the Olympic team, but Nedoroscik is so good at pommel horse and the men's team hasn't won an Olympic medal in so long, that they made an exception for the 25-year-old Penn State grad and Worcester, MA native who's spent the last decade of his life training for this singular Olympic event. On Monday, that exception paid off! Nedoroscik delivered a jaw-dropping, 45-second routine that looked as though the heavens were holding up his legs with wires, and he was being spun around by God herself. It was the type of Moment we all watch the Olympics for, and his effort won Team USA a bronze medal—the U.S. men's gymnastics team's first Olympic medal in 16 years. The internet has continued to go wild for Nedoroscik, who'll compete again in the event finals on Saturday. Obsessed that Stephen Nedoroscik’s only job was the pommel horse and bro COOKED pic.twitter.com/H4Nne8q79W — Brittany Sdao (@besdao) July 29, 2024 But, what the internet doesn't know is that Nedoroscik isn't just from Worcester, MA, he's from "Worcester: Paris of the Eighties," MA. I grew up north of Boston, but my boyfriend is actually from Worcester, so I feel uniquely qualified to ensure this decades-old regional joke is properly relayed to the masses. IOC: Steve! Welcome to Paris Steve Nedoroscik: actually, I’m from Worcester, the Paris of the 80s https://t.co/83zT6O60AG — Megan Johnson (@megansarahj) July 28, 2024 This shirt was made for this moment — Worcester is no longer just the ‘Paris of the Eighties’… it’s the Paris of the 2020s. Worcester is the Paris of NOW. #mapoli https://t.co/BOYq10jnU2 pic.twitter.com/uMrUwEeY8w — “N” in Nicole (she/her) means Not Your Asian Virus (@nicolewhaat) July 29, 2024 He's comfortable because Worcester is the Paris of the 80s. — Adam Parison (@adam_parison) July 30, 2024 The best part? There's not much to relay! It was the city's official motto at one point during the 80s, but no one really knows who thought of it or why. And since Worcester—despite having some great restaurants, some great universities, and a pretty solid art museum—is very much anything but Paris, it stuck as a fun little quip. (But a quip that's made for some great novelty t-shirts.) They do have tiny red hearts on all their street signs, so I guess, if you really wanted, you could try to make the argument that Worcester, just like Paris, is for lovers...but it would be a bad argument. In 2013, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette covered the opening of a downtown coffee shop that named itself after the slogan, writing, "The name of the café dates back to when the official motto for Worcester was 'Worcester: Paris of the Eighties,' said [general manager Erika] Dunn. The promotion at that time was aimed at bringing people downtown, breathing more life into the city, she said." Sounds like a solid slogan explanation to me. Other than this article and a bunch more tweets, there's not much I can…
