The person who has participated in the most Olympic gymnastics, 8 times… Uzbekistan’s Chusovitina injured | Dong-A Ilbo

Paris Olympic qualifying record broken

The “Iron Lady” Oksana Chusovitina (49, Uzbekistan, photo) will retire from the Olympics after a 32-year absence. Chusovitina is a gymnast who participated in eight consecutive Olympic Games, from Barcelona 1992 to Tokyo 2021. Chusovitina is the only gymnast, male or female, to have participated in eight Olympic Games.

Chusovitina said: “I was injured during training. Therefore, I will not be able to participate in the Asian Championships held in Tashkent (the capital of Uzbekistan) together with the Paris Olympic qualifiers.” He left a message on Instagram on the 23rd (local time).

Chusovitina was born in 1975, when Uzbekistan was still part of the Soviet Union. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, he represented the CIS country at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics and won the gold medal in the team event. After that, he represented Uzbekistan in competitions until the 2004 Athens Olympics. After receiving an invitation to “help his son with leukemia”, he became a German citizen and won a silver medal in the vault at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Chusovitina said: “I will not grow old until my son is cured.” In 2013, after her son recovered, she regained her Uzbek citizenship and subsequently represented her country in two more Olympic Games.

Reporter Lim Bo-mi bom@donga.com