Nadia Elena Comăneci (ˈnadi.a koməˈnet͡ʃʲ; born November 12, 1961) is a
RomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
n
gymnastGymnastics is a sport involving performance of exercises requiring physical strength, flexibility, agility, coordination, and balance. Internationally, all of the gymnastic sports are governed by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique with each country having its own national governing body...
, winner of three
OlympicThe Olympic Games is a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world’s foremost sports competition where more than 200 nations participate...
gold medals at the
1976 Summer OlympicsThe 1976 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event celebrated in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in 1976. Montreal was awarded the rights to the 1976 Games on May 12, 1970, at the 69th IOC Session in Amsterdam, over the bids of Moscow and...
in
MontrealMontreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
,
QuebecQuebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
,
CanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, and the first female gymnast ever to be awarded a
perfect score of 10In gymnastics, the maximum possible score was a perfect 10 until the rules were changed in 2006 by the International Gymnastics Federation...
in an Olympic gymnastic event. She is also the winner of two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics. She is one of the best-known gymnasts in the world. In 2000 Comăneci was named as one of the athletes of the century by the
Laureus World Sports AcademyThe Laureus World Sports Awards are awarded annually to sportspeople who have been outstanding during the previous year. The Laureus World Sports Awards were established in 1999 by Founding Patrons Daimler and Richemont and is supported by its Global Partners Mercedes-Benz, IWC Schaffhausen and...
.
Early life
Comăneci was born in Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej (now
OneștiOnești is a city in Bacău County, Romania, with a population of 51,681 inhabitants.Administratively, the villages of Slobozia and Borzești form part of Onești...
),
RomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
, as the daughter of Gheorghe and Ștefania-Alexandrina. Her pregnant mother was watching a Russian film in which the heroine's name was Nadya, the
diminutiveIn language structure, a diminutive, or diminutive form , is a formation of a word used to convey a slight degree of the root meaning, smallness of the object or quality named, encapsulation, intimacy, or endearment...
version of the Russian name
NadezhdaNadezhda or Nadežda is a Slavic female given name popular in Russia, Bulgaria, Serbia and other Slavic countries. It means "hope". A Ukrainian version of this name is Nadiya , Cyrillic Надія...
(which means "Hope"). She decided that her daughter would be named Nadia, too. Comăneci also has a younger brother named Adrian.
Early gymnastics career
Nadia began gymnastics in kindergarten with a local team called "Flacăra", with coaches Duncan and Munteanu. At age 6 she was chosen to attend
Béla KárolyiBéla Károlyi is a Romanian gymnastics coach. He was born in what was then Kolozsvár, Hungary, a region restored to Romanian administration after 1944. Károlyi and his wife, Márta, also of Hungarian origin, emigrated to the United States in 1981 and both have dual citizenships for Romania and the...
's experimental gymnastics school after Karolyi spotted her and a friend turning
cartwheelIn gymnastics, a cartwheel is a sideways rotary movement performed by bringing the hands to the ground while the body inverts and the legs travel over the body, coming down to a standing position.-Terminology:...
s in a schoolyard. Nadia was training with the Károlyis by the time she was 7 years old, in 1968. She was one of the first students at the gymnastics school established in Onești by Béla and his wife, Marta. Unlike many of the other students at the Károlyi school, Comăneci was able to commute from home for many years because she lived in the area.
Nadia placed 13th in her first Romanian National Championships in 1969. A year later, in 1970, she began competing as a member of her hometown team and became the youngest gymnast ever to win the Romanian Nationals. In 1971, she participated in her first international competition, a dual junior meet between Romania and
YugoslaviaThe Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the Yugoslav state that existed from the abolition of the Yugoslav monarchy until it was dissolved in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars. It was a socialist state and a federation made up of six socialist republics: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,...
, winning her first all-around title and contributing to the team
goldA gold medal is typically the medal awarded for highest achievement in a non-military field. Its name derives from the use of at least a fraction of gold in form of plating or alloying in its manufacture...
. For the next few years, she competed as a junior in numerous national contests in Romania and additional dual meets with nearby countries such as
HungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
,
ItalyItaly , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
and
PolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
. At the age of 11, in 1973, she won the all-around gold, as well as the
vaultThe vault is an artistic gymnastics apparatus, as well as the skill performed using that apparatus. Vaulting is also the action of performing a vault. Both male and female gymnasts perform the vault...
and uneven bars titles, at the Junior Friendship Tournament (Druzhba), an important meet for junior gymnasts.
Nadia first major international success came at the age of 13, when she nearly swept the 1975 European Championships in
Skien' is a city and municipality in Telemark county, Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Grenland. The administrative centre of the municipality is the city of Skien. Skien is also the administrative centre of Telemark county....
,
NorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
, winning the all-around and gold medals on every event but the
floor exerciseIn gymnastics, the floor refers to a specially prepared exercise surface, which is considered an apparatus. It is used by both male and female gymnasts. The event in gymnastics performed on floor is called floor exercise. The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring is FX.A spring...
, in which she placed second. She continued to enjoy success in other meets in 1975, winning the all-around at the "Champions All" competition and placing first in the all-around, vault, beam, and bars at the Romanian National Championships. In the Pre-Olympic test event in
MontrealMontreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, Comăneci won the all-around and the balance beam golds, as well as
silverA silver medal is a medal awarded to the second place finisher of contests such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, and contests with similar formats....
s in the vault, floor, and bars behind accomplished Soviet gymnast
Nellie KimNellie Vladimirovna Kim is a retired Soviet gymnast who won three gold medals and a silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, and two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics...
, who would prove to be one of her greatest
rivalA sports rivalry is intense competition between athletic teams or athletes. This pressure of competition is felt by players, coaches, and management, but is perhaps felt strongest by the fans. The intensity of the rivalry varies from a friendly competition on one end to serious violence on the...
s over the next five years.
In March 1976, Comăneci competed in the inaugural edition of the
American CupThe American Cup, is an elite senior level international gymnastics competition held in the United States, and is generally considered to be one of the first major competitions of the Gymnastics season, as it is held in March or February of each year. In 1978-79 the event was sponsored by Dial and...
at
Madison Square GardenMadison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...
in
New YorkNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. She received unprecedented scores of 10.0, which signified a perfect routine without any deductions, on vault in both the preliminary and final rounds of competition and won the all-around. Comăneci also received 10s in other meets in 1976, including the prestigious Chunichi Cup competition in
JapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, where she posted perfect marks on the vault and uneven bars.
The international community took note of Comăneci: she was named the
United Press InternationalUnited Press International is a once-major international news agency, whose newswires, photo, news film and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines and radio and television stations for most of the twentieth century...
's "Female Athlete of the Year" for 1975.
Montreal Olympics
At the age of 14, Comăneci became one of the stars of the
1976 Summer OlympicsThe 1976 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event celebrated in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in 1976. Montreal was awarded the rights to the 1976 Games on May 12, 1970, at the 69th IOC Session in Amsterdam, over the bids of Moscow and...
in
MontrealMontreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
. During the team portion of the competition on July 18, her routine on the uneven bars was scored at a 10.0. It was the first time in modern Olympic gymnastics history that the score had ever been awarded. The scoreboards were not even equipped to display scores of 10.0—so Nadia's perfect marks were reported on the boards as 1.00 instead. Over the course of the Olympics, Comăneci would earn six additional 10s, en route to capturing the all-around, beam, and bars titles and a
bronze medalA bronze medal is a medal awarded to the third place finisher of contests such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, etc. The practice of awarding bronze third place medals began at the 1904 Olympic Games in St...
on the floor exercise. The Romanian team also placed second in the team competition.
Comăneci was the first Romanian gymnast to win the all-around title at the Olympics. She also holds the record as the youngest Olympic gymnastics all-around champion ever; with the revised age-eligibility requirements in the sport (gymnasts must now turn 16 in the calendar year to compete in the Olympics; in 1976 gymnasts had to be 14 by the first day of the competition), it is currently not possible to legally break this record.
Comăneci's achievements at the Olympics generated a significant amount of media attention. An instrumental piece from the musical score of the 1971 film
Bless the Beasts and ChildrenBless the Beasts and Children is a 1971 film adaptation of the novel of the same name, by Glendon Swarthout, that was directed by Stanley Kramer, featuring Bill Mumy and Barry Robins.-Plot:...
, "Cotton's Dream" (which was also used as the title theme music from the American
soap operaA soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
The Young and the RestlessThe Young and the Restless is an American television soap opera created by William J. Bell and Lee Phillip Bell for CBS. The show is set in a fictional Wisconsin town called Genoa City, which is unlike and unrelated to the real life village of the same name, Genoa City, Wisconsin...
) became associated with her after cinematographer/feature reporter
Robert RigerRobert Riger was a celebrated sports illustrator, photographer, award-winning television director, and cinematographer....
used it against slow-motion montages of Nadia on the television program
ABC's Wide World Of SportsABC's Wide World of Sports is a sports anthology series on American television that ran from 1961 to 1998 and was originally hosted by Jim McKay. The title continued to be used for general sports programs until 2006...
. The song became a top ten single in the fall of 1976, and the composers,
Barry De VorzonBarry De Vorzon is an American singer, songwriter, producer, and composer. His first composing big hit was the rock song "Dreamin'," sung by Johnny Burnette in 1960, although he had a number-one hit previously called "Just Married," which he wrote for Marty Robbins in 1958...
and
Perry Botkin, Jr.Perry Botkin, Jr. is an American composer, producer, arranger, and musician. He had a successful career in music for over forty years. As an arranger, he worked with Bobby Darin, Harry Nilsson, The Lettermen, Ed Ames, and Harpers Bizarre, among others...
, renamed it to "
Nadia's Theme"Nadia's Theme" is a piece of music composed by Barry De Vorzon and Perry Botkin, Jr. that serves as the theme music to the American television soap opera The Young and the Restless.-Origins:...
" after her. However, Comăneci never actually performed to "Nadia's Theme." Her floor exercise music was a medley of the songs "
Yes Sir, That's My Baby"Yes Sir, That's My Baby" is a U.S. popular song from 1925.The music was written by Walter Donaldson and the lyrics by Gus Kahn. It was a hit for Ace Brigode in 1925 and for Eddie Cantor in 1930. It was later a hit for Rick Nelson in the 1950s and Frank Sinatra in the 1960s...
" and "Jump in the Line" arranged for piano. Nadia Comăneci's achievements are also pictured in the entrance area of the Madison Square Garden in New York City presenting her perfect 10.00 beam-exercise.
She was the 1976 BBC Sports Personality of the Year in the overseas athletes category and the
Associated PressThe Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
's 1976 "Female Athlete of the Year". She also retained her title as the UPI Female Athlete of the Year. Back home in Romania, Comăneci's success led her to be named a "
Hero of Socialist LaborHero of Socialist Labour was an honorary title in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries. It was the highest degree of distinction for exceptional achievements in national economy and culture...
"; she was the youngest Romanian to receive such recognition during the administration of
Nicolae CeauşescuNicolae Ceaușescu was a Romanian Communist politician. He was General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and as such was the country's second and last Communist leader...
.
1977–1980
Comăneci successfully defended her European all-around title in 1977, but when questions about the scoring were raised, Ceauşescu ordered the Romanian gymnasts to return home. The team followed orders and controversially walked out of the competition during the event finals.
Following the 1977 Europeans, the Romanian Gymnastics Federation removed Comăneci from her longtime coaches, the Károlyis, and sent her to
BucharestBucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
to train at the 23 August sports complex. The change was not positive for Comăneci. Grappling with both the stress of her parents' divorce and the new training environment, she was extremely unhappy and her gymnastics and overall fitness suffered. Heavier and out-of-shape, Comăneci competed in the
1978 World ChampionshipsThe 19th Artistic Gymnastics World Championships were held in Strasbourg, France, in 1978 from October 23 to October 29.The new rule was introduced: eight gymnasts competed in each of the apparatus finals....
. A fall from the uneven bars resulted in a 4th place finish in the all-around behind
Elena MukhinaElena Vyacheslavovna Mukhina , born in Moscow, Russian SFSR, was a former Soviet gymnast who won the All-Around title at the 1978 World Championships at Strasbourg, France...
, Nellie Kim, and
Natalia ShaposhnikovaNatalia Vitalyevna Shaposhnikova , , married name Natalia Sout, was a Soviet gymnast, two-time Olympic Champion, Honoured Master of Sports of the USSR. She was born in Rostov on Don, Russian SFSR. She was known for her risky and original skills along with her expressive choreography, especially on...
, but Comăneci won the beam title.
After the 1978 Worlds, Comăneci was permitted to return to Deva and to the Károlyis. In 1979, a newly slim and motivated Comăneci won her third consecutive European all-around title, becoming the first gymnast, male or female, to achieve the feat. At the World Championships that December, Comăneci led the field after the compulsory competition but was hospitalized before the optional portion of the team competition for blood poisoning caused by a cut in her wrist from her metal grip buckle. Against doctors' orders, she left the hospital and competed on the beam, where she scored a 9.95. Her performance helped give the Romanians their first team gold medal. After her performance, Comăneci spent several days recovering in All Saints Hospital and underwent a minor surgical procedure for the infected hand, which had developed an
abscessAn abscess is a collection of pus that has accumulated in a cavity formed by the tissue in which the pus resides due to an infectious process or other foreign materials...
.
Comăneci participated in the
1980 Summer OlympicsThe 1980 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXII Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event celebrated in Moscow in the Soviet Union. In addition, the yachting events were held in Tallinn, and some of the preliminary matches and the quarter-finals of the football tournament...
in Moscow, where she placed second, by a small margin, to
Yelena DavydovaYelena Victorovna Davydova , is a former Soviet gymnast. She is the 1980 Olympic all-around champion, and is now a top coach in Canada.-Childhood training:...
. She defended her Olympic title in the balance beam and tied with
Nellie KimNellie Vladimirovna Kim is a retired Soviet gymnast who won three gold medals and a silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, and two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics...
for the gold medal in the floor exercise. The Romanian team finished second overall.
Comăneci retired from competition in 1981. Her official retirement ceremony took place in Bucharest in 1984 and was attended by the
International Olympic CommitteeThe International Olympic Committee is an international corporation based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin on 23 June 1894 with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president...
Chairman.
Post retirement
In 1981, Comăneci participated in a gymnastics exhibition tour in the United States. During the tour, her coaches, Béla and Marta Károlyi, along with the Romanian team choreographer Géza Pozsár, defected. Upon her return to Romania, Comăneci's actions were strictly monitored. She was granted leave to attend the
1984 OlympicsThe 1984 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIII Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event held in Los Angeles, California, United States in 1984...
in
Los AngelesLos Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
but was supervised for the entire trip. Aside from that journey, and a few select trips to Moscow and Cuba, Comăneci was forbidden to leave the country for any reason." "Life..." she wrote in her autobiography, "took on a new bleakness."
In Romania, between 1984 and 1989, Comăneci was a member of the Romanian Gymnastics Federation and helped coach the Romanian junior gymnasts. In November 1989, a few weeks before the
revolutionThe Romanian Revolution of 1989 was a series of riots and clashes in December 1989. These were part of the Revolutions of 1989 that occurred in several Warsaw Pact countries...
, she defected with a group of other young Romanians. Her overland journey took her through Hungary, Austria, and finally, to the United States. Her initial arrival in the United States generated some negative press, focusing on her penchant for heavy makeup and flashy clothes, and the fact that her constant companion Constantin Panait (a Romanian exile who arranged her escape from Romania and initially exercised considerable control over her as her self-appointed business manager) was a married father of four.
With the help of her former coach Béla Károlyi and his friend Alexandru Stefu, a Romanian rugby coach, Comăneci was able to make a break with Panait and settle in Montreal. She successfully distanced herself from the image problems of her initial arrival from Romania. Comăneci spent most of her time touring and promoting lines of gymnastics apparel and aerobic equipment. She also dabbled in modeling, appearing in advertisements for wedding dresses and Jockey underwear.
While she was living in Montreal,
Bart ConnerBart Wayne Conner is a former American gymnast who, as a member of the gold medal-winning men's gymnastics team at the 1984 Summer Olympic Games won an individual gold on the parallel bars...
, whom she had met for the first time in 1976 at the American Cup, contacted her and invited her to live in Oklahoma. They became engaged in 1994. Together with Conner, she returned to Romania for the first time since her defection (and since the fall of Communism and
CeauşescuNicolae Ceaușescu was a Romanian Communist politician. He was General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and as such was the country's second and last Communist leader...
's death), and the couple were married in Bucharest on April 27, 1996. The ceremony was broadcast live in Romania, and the reception was held in the former presidential palace.
On June 29, 2001, Comăneci became a naturalized citizen of the United States. She has also retained her Romanian passport, making her a dual citizen.
In December 2003, Comăneci's book
Letters To A Young GymnastThe Art of Mentoring series was a series of books published by Basic Books from 2001 to 2008, beginning with Alan Dershowitz's Letters to a Young Lawyer and Christopher Hitchens' Letters to a Young Contrarian. The books were all titled in the form "Letters to a Young ____", in the spirit of Rainer...
was published, a combination of mentoring book and memoir. The book answered questions that she has received in letters from fans. She has also been the subject of several unofficial biographies, television documentaries and a made-for-television film,
Nadia, that was broadcast in the United States shortly before the 1984 Olympics.
Comăneci and Conner welcomed their first child, a son named Dylan Paul Conner, on June 3, 2006 in
Oklahoma CityOklahoma City is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma.Oklahoma City may also refer to:*Oklahoma City metropolitan area*Downtown Oklahoma City*Uptown Oklahoma City*Oklahoma City bombing*Oklahoma City National Memorial...
,
OklahomaOklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
.
Recent activities
Comăneci is active in many charities and international organizations. In 1999, she became the first athlete to be invited to speak at the
United NationsThe United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
to launch the Year 2000 International Year of Volunteers. She is currently the Vice-Chair of the Board Of Directors of the International
Special OlympicsSpecial Olympics is the world's largest sports organization for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, providing year-round training and competitions to more than 3.1 million athletes in 175 countries....
and Vice President of the Board of Directors of the
Muscular Dystrophy AssociationThe Muscular Dystrophy Association is an American organization which combats muscular dystrophy and diseases of the nervous system and muscular system in general by funding research, providing medical and community services, and educating health professionals and the general public...
. She has also personally funded the construction and operation of the Nadia Comăneci Children's Clinic, a clinic in Bucharest that provides low-cost and free medical and social support to Romanian children.
In 2003, the Romanian government appointed her as an Honorary Consul General of Romania to the United States to deal with bilateral relations between the two nations. She performs this function based out of her
Norman, OklahomaNorman is a city in Cleveland County, Oklahoma, United States, and is located south of downtown Oklahoma City. It is part of the Oklahoma City metropolitan area. As of the 2010 census, Norman was to have 110,925 full-time residents, making it the third-largest city in Oklahoma and the...
office.
In the world of gymnastics, Comăneci is the Honorary President of the Romanian Gymnastics Federation, the Honorary President of Romanian Olympic Committee, Ambassador of Sports of Romania and a member of the International Gymnastics Federation Foundation. She and her husband own the Bart Conner Gymnastics Academy, the Perfect 10 Production Company and several sports equipment shops. They are also the editors of
International Gymnast magazine. Additionally, Comăneci and Conner have provided television commentary for many gymnastics meets, most recently the 2005 World Championships in
MelbourneMelbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
and the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. In 2004, her 10.0 Montreal uneven bars routine was featured in a commercial for
AdidasAdidas AG is a German sports apparel manufacturer and parent company of the Adidas Group, which consists of the Reebok sportswear company, TaylorMade-Adidas golf company , and Rockport...
which ran during the Athens Olympics.
On August 10, 2007, Nadia was a "mob" participant on the American version of the game show
1 vs 1001 vs. 100 is an American game show that was broadcast by NBC from 2006–08, and is revived on GSN with a new series which began in November 2010. As in other formats, a single player goes up against 100 other contestants . The 1 gains money for every Mob member eliminated, but loses all winnings...
, and was not eliminated until the last 20 members of the mob were left. In January 2008, she was one of the contestants in the celebrity edition of
Donald TrumpDonald John Trump, Sr. is an American business magnate, television personality and author. He is the chairman and president of The Trump Organization and the founder of Trump Entertainment Resorts. Trump's extravagant lifestyle, outspoken manner and role on the NBC reality show The Apprentice have...
's television program
The ApprenticeThe Celebrity Apprentice is the seventh installment of the United States version of the reality television series, The Apprentice. This season features celebrity candidates vying for the title of Donald Trump's, "Best Business Brain," as a way to revitalize the series, with the winner donating...
.
Awards
Comăneci received the
Olympic OrderThe Olympic Order is the highest award of the Olympic Movement, created by the International Olympic Committee in May 1975 as a successor to the Olympic Certificate previously awarded. The Olympic Order originally had three grades , although the bronze grade was retired in 1984...
, the highest award given by the
International Olympic CommitteeThe International Olympic Committee is an international corporation based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin on 23 June 1894 with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president...
, in 1984 and 2004. She is the only person to receive this honor twice, and was also the youngest recipient. She has also been inducted into the
International Gymnastics Hall of FameThe International Gymnastics Hall of Fame, located in Oklahoma City, USA, is a hall of fame dedicated to honoring the achievements and contributions of the world's greatest competitors, coaches and authorities in artistic gymnastics....
.
Special skills
Comăneci was known for her clean technique, innovative and difficult original skills, and her stoic, cool demeanor in competition.
On the uneven bars, Comăneci performed her own release move, a kip to front salto. The skill is named after her in the women's
Code of PointsA Code of Points is a rulebook that defines the scoring system for each level of competition in gymnastics. There is no unified, international code of points; every oversight organization—such as FIG , NCAA Gymnastics, and most national gymnastics federations—designs and employs its own unique Code...
and, as of 2005, was rated as an 'E' element. Also named for her is the 'Comăneci dismount' a half twist to back salto.
On the balance beam, Comăneci was the first gymnast to successfully perform an aerial walkover and an aerial cartwheel-back handspring flight series. She is also credited as being the first gymnast to perform a double-twist dismount.
Comăneci's skills on the floor exercise included a double back salto and a double twist.
Pop culture references
- Nadia is a 1984 made-for-television biopic of Nadia Comăneci.
See also
External links