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Simona Amânar (born October 7 , 1979 in Constanţa ) is a Romania n Gymnast . Amânar began participating in gymnastics as a 6-year-old, and became a national team member in 1994 , winning the World and European team titles that year. The following year, she was again part of the winning Romanian team at the World Championships, while winning an individual gold medal in the Vault , her strongest event. At the 1996 Summer Olympics , Amânar would win that same event. In the all-around competition, due to a fall in team compulsories, she hadn't placed for the final. However, in a scenario similar to the 1992 Olympic substitution by the Unified Team of Tatiana Gutsu for Rozalia Galiyeva , Amânar was favored instead of teammate Alexandra Marinescu because she had the highest optional all-around score among women. She eventually ended up sharing the bronze medal with teammate Lavinia Milosovici behind Lilia Podkopayeva of the Ukraine (gold) and Romanian Gina Gogean . She won three more medals, a silver in the Floor Exercise a bronze in the team competition and a gold on vault. Amanar's double twisting Yurchenko Vault was particularly difficult and well performed, and it was this rather than her weaker second vault that helped her push Mo Huilan of China into second place. Ironically Amânar would again replace a higher performing Marinescu in the 1997 World All-Around Championships. She would win the silver medal behind Svetlana Khorkina of Russia. She actually performed better and scored higher than Khorkina on three of the four pieces, but the discrepancy between their bars performances gave the title to Khorkina (Khorkina is twice Olympic champion on this piece, whereas it was Simona's weakest- a fall from bars killed her medal chances in the 1999 world championships). Amânar continued to be a top performer in the horse vault, winning the world title again in 1997 , and team titles in 1997 and 1999 . At the 2000 Summer Olympics , the top favourite for the all-around title, Svetlana Khorkina of Russia , stumbled in a number of events, leaving the title up for grabs for the three Romanian women competing in the final. Andrea Răducan finished first, trailed by Amânar and Maria Olaru . However, it was later discovered that Răducan had used a cold medicine containing banned substances. Although she was not banned, and her results in other events were allowed to stand, Răducan was stripped of her gold medal, which now went to Amânar instead. Earlier in the Olympics, the Romanian women had already secured the team title. In the floor exercise, she won her seventh Olympic medal, a bronze. In the vault, she performed the vault that bears her name, a Yurchenko with two and a half twists. It remains the most difficult vault ever completed by a woman in Olympic competition. Amanar retired in 2000 after the World Cup finals, and is now married with one son. She still lives in Romania. |
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