Viet German Wins Silver in Gymnastics All-Around

Viet German Surprise: Marcel Nguyen wins international fans with a breakout performance and pop idol looks.

Japan’s Kohei Uchimura won the gold medal in the men’s gymnastics all-around competition Wednesday as expected with a total score of 92.690. Cuban American Danell Leyva’s bronze with a score of 90.695 wasn’t a surprise either.

“I have been a world champion three times, three years in a row,” said Uchimura. “But this is different. It’s once in four years, and the wait was there. I felt like the demon was chasing me this time.”

Uchimura had managed to build up a bit of suspense with some botched routines during qualifying where he finished ninth after falling off both high bar and pommel horse. He had added to the questions in the team finals where he flubbed his pommel horse routine and had to appeal his score to get a silver medal for Japan.

But in the all-around competition Uchimura came as close to all-around perfection as any gymnast had ever come.

“If I spoke Japanese, I would tell him that he is the best gymnast that ever lived – so far,” remarked Danell Leyva. “I’m going to keep working to beat him. His gymnastics is just so beautiful. I’m working toward that. I’m not trying to copy his style, I have my own style. I need to perfect me more to beat him.”

Leyva took a big step toward establishing his own style of art with spectacular crowd-pleasing routines on parallel bars and the high bar — both of which he needed to win the bronze.

The big surprise was the man who won Germany’s first medal in the men’s gymnastics all-around since 1936 with an impressive score of 90.695. Before the London Olympics Marcel Nguyen hadn’t made much of a splash in international gymnastics circles. As the second youngest member of the German team, the Vietnamese German’s most impressive results had been sharing in the team bronze at the 2007 Worlds and a silver at the 2008 European championship.

Nguyen’s other successes had been confined to the 2008 German championships where he won silvers in floor and parallel bars and a bronze in the all-around. His biggest distinction had been a full-twisting double somersault dismount from the parallel bars which is very rarely used.

Nguyen has begun attracting attention in London both for his Vietnamese heritage and for his GQ-model looks. He was born to a Vietnamese father and a German mother in Munich on September 8, 1987. He began taking an interest in gymnastics at the age of four but his serious training began in 1995 at the regional training center in Munich. In 2002 he was elevated to the Junior National Team, and became the national junior champion on parallel bars, runner up on rings and third in vault.

At his first world championships later that year in Melbourne Nguyen finished 16th on the parallel bars.

Nguyen was a member of the bronze-medal team for the team competition at the 2007 Worlds.

He enjoys skateboarding when he has time and energy spare from gymnastics training.