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Eight-time Olympian Oksana Chusovitina bid farewell to gymnastics and her flagship event Sunday night in Tokyo after competing in vault for the last time in her rich Olympic career.
With a score of 14.166, the 46-year-old competing for Uzbekistan narrowly missed the final of the event, but that didn’t stop the applause from the few in attendance and the emotional response from Chusovitina. She wiped the tears from her eyes and waved to the crowd. Then she made a heart with her hands.
“It was really good,” Oksana said after the event. “I cried tears of happiness because so many people have supported me for a long time.”
Chusovitina made her first appearance at the Games in 1992. In that year, she competed with athletes from the former Soviet Union as a member of the unified team, which won gold. Chusovitina won silver in vault in 2008, when she was 33, while competing for Germany. She competed for three separate nations and won 11 world championship medals.
The gymnast is leaving the sport at a time when athletes like Simone Biles, who is 24, are questioning age standards in gymnastics. Chusovitina, who is a member of the 2017 class of the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame, has become a sports icon due to its durability over the decades. Before there was Biles or Chellsie Memmel, 32 years old and two children, there was Chusovitina.
Her next act will be spending time with her family.
“My son is 22 and I want to hang out with him,” Chusovitina told USA Today Sports. “I want to be a mom and a wife.
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