Competition description

In artistic gymnastics, men and women compete separately. Men compete on six apparatus: floor, pommel horse, rings, vault, parallel bars and horizontal bar. Women compete on four apparatus: vault, uneven bars, beam and floor.

There are four competition phases in gymnastics: qualifications, team finals, individual allaround finals, and individual apparatus finals.

Qualifications: All gymnasts compete as part of a team or individuals and the results of this competition are used to qualify gymnasts for the team, individual all-around and the apparatus finals. No scores are carried over from the qualifications to the finals.

Team finals: They involve only the top eight (8) men’s and women’s teams from the qualifications. The teams compete again on all apparatus and the team with the highest total score claims the team title.

All-around finals: The 24 top men and women from the qualifications (maximum two per NOC/NF), proceed to the individual all-round finals. The gymnasts perform again on all pieces of apparatus and those with the highest scores claim the medals in the individual all-around. The individual all-around title is considered to be the premium achievement in gymnastics.

Apparatus finals: The top eight (8) men and women who placed highest on each apparatus in the qualifications (no more than two per NOC/NF) compete for the apparatus titles.

Difference between the FIG world championships and Olympic Games

There is a restriction on entry to the Olympic Games. Only the top twelve men’s and women’s teams and a designated number of nations with individuals, can participate. The World Championships are open to all FIG member federations.

In short, the Olympic Games have fewer competitors than the World Championships.

Judging

Artistic gymnastics is a judgement sport with a panel of eight judges presiding over each apparatus. The eight judges are broken down into two panels. The D (difficulty) panel (two judges) calculates the D Score which is the score a gymnast receives based on the content of the routine. The E (execution) panel (six judges) determine deductions from the maximum possible score of 10.00 pts based on the execution of the routine.

Calculation of Scores

The highest and lowest of the 6 E judges scores are dropped and the average of the 4 remaining scores is used to calculate the individual score. Example:
D score 6.00
E score (E judge scores) 9.30 (9.10 9.20 9.60 9.30 9.40 9.30)
Final score: 15.30

Tie-Break Rules

Ties break rules exist to determine which individual gymnasts or teams advance to the finals in case of ties for the last qualification place.

Penalties / Disqualification Rules

Penalties can be imposed on either an individual gymnast or on a team as a whole depending on the infraction:

• Individual penalties can include, for example, going out of bounds on floor, exceeding a time
  limit for a routine, exceeding the limited time for warm up or for resuming performance, after
  having fallen down from an apparatus.
  These types of penalties are deducted from the gymnast’s score for the apparatus.
• More general penalties can include wearing inappropriate attire and are deducted from the
  gymnast’s all-around total score for the day or from the apparatus score, where first noticed, for
  gymnasts not competing in the all-around.
  There are two types of disqualification (DSQ):
• Disqualification as a result of a breach of the FIG technical rules and regulations (decisions
  are taken by the competition jury).
• Disqualification as a result of infringing recognised sport ethics and rules (e.g. positive doping
  control) (decisions are taken by the IOC and FIG authorities).

If a gymnast is disqualified from a phase of the competition, his/her name and results will be eliminated and removed from the disputed phase and the results of the phase will be recalculated. Disqualification from competition 1 means that the gymnast may not proceed to any finals. Disqualification from competition 2 means that the gymnast receives no results in competition 2, but the gymnast may compete in competitions 3 and 4 if qualified.

For team competition the disqualified gymnast’s name and his/her results will be removed from the team and the team results will be re-calculated.

In any of the above situations, the affected results output(s) will be produced as a “correction” with an explanation.

A gymnast can be expelled from the competition. In case of an expulsion, the gymnast in question will not be allowed to continue the competition. The scores achieved to the point of expulsion will count and remain as part of the results for individuals or teams.

Inquiries / Appeals

A written inquiry may be submitted to the jury only regarding the value of the D scores.