defending p-bar champ slated to go last. The penultimate competitor was Uzbekistan’s Anton Fokin,
who showed the most effortless peaches and highest Belle of the day. Then he planted a tucked double front that helped him to earn the highest B-score of the final, 9. 50. Trouble was, his A-score
trailed Petkovsek’s and Kim’s by . 10, and his total
was 16.200.
Yang figured to put everyone out of their misery
with his 7.0 set, but he blew his first skill, a peach-half that nearly went over the side of the rails.
Petkovsek tied for gold with Kim and will be going
to the Olympics, and Fokin won the bronze, the
first men’s world medal for his country.
HORIZONTAL BAR
THOMAS SCHRE YER
Two of eight finalists were competing for an individual berth to Beijing, and the pressure must have
been unbearable. Epke Zonderland, who had
earned a spot already for the Netherlands with his
prelim all-around effort, opened the event with a
wild set (Kovacs-Kolman) that scored 15.700.
2005 world high bar champion Aljaz Pegan followed and needed a title here to join fellow
Slovenian Petkovsek in Beijing. The tall veteran did
what he could, including his signature Gaylord-half,
and needed only a hop on his triple for an event-leading 15.825 ( 6. 8 A-score).
Pegan’s score virtually ended the slim chance of
Jeffrey Wammes (Netherlands) sending himself to
Beijing with a high bar win. The versatile Dutch
gymnast posted a 15.100 with only 6. 4 of difficulty, and then was also passed by Japan’s Mizutori’s
15.775 (Takemoto-Yamawaki; layout Kovacs,
Kolman, Kovacs).
These worlds probably couldn’t end soon enough
for Tomita, who continued his struggles in Stuttgart
with two falls here (Kolman, inside-Stalder-Rybalko), and Italy’s Enrico Pozzo followed with a
poor Takemoto and low A-score to tie Wammes.
Pegan figured his lead might be challenged by the
next two competitors, two-time world high bar
champion Vlasios Maras of Greece, and hometown
hero Hambüchen.
Maras, whose team had already qualified one
gymnast to Beijing after placing 18th, was looking
good until his hand never fully regrasped the bar on
a Stalder-Rybalko. His fall left him in seventh.
Pegan’s fate was now in the hands of
Hambüchen, who a year ago could not keep hold
of the high bar to save his life. This time, though,
he caught his fickle Kolman, linked a Takemoto to
Yamawaki and a layout Tkatchev to Tkatchev, and
stuck his layout double-double. The smile on his
face afterward was bad news for Pegan, who
dropped to second. Hambüchen led the event in
both A-score ( 7.0) and B-score ( 9.250) for a golden
16.250.
Given the circumstances, Hambüchen really had
nothing to lose as he put the final touch on these
worlds. “I was the last one on high bar and knew
what everybody did before me,” said the 19-year-
old from Wetzlar. “I just thought, OK, no risk, no
fun. Just do it. And, well, it was the best routine of
my life.” IG
Germany’s Fabian Hambüchen gave the home
crowd a fitting close to the competition by
winning high bar, his first world title.
