Pommel horse at the Olympics

Pommel horse at the Olympic Games
Pommel horse competition at the 2016 Summer Olympics
Overview
Sport	Artistic gymnastics
Gender	Men
Years held	Men: 1896, 1904, 1924–2024
Reigning champion
Men	Rhys McClenaghan (IRL)

The pommel horse is an artistic gymnastics event held at the Summer Olympics. The event was first held for men at the first modern Olympics in 1896. It was held again in 1904, but not in 1900, 1908, 1912, or 1920 when no apparatus events were awarded medals. The pommel horse was one of the components of the men's artistic individual all-around in 1900, however. The men's pommel horse returned as a medal event in 1924 and has been held every Games since. Pommel horse scores were included in the individual all-around for 1924 and 1928, with no separate apparatus final. In 1932, the pommel horse was entirely separate from the all-around. From 1936 to 1956, there were again no separate apparatus finals with the pommel horse scores used in the all-around. Beginning in 1960, there were separate apparatus finals.

Medalists

Men

The medals have been swept four times, something which is no longer possible under current rules: by the United States in 1904, Switzerland in 1924, Finland in 1948, and the Soviet Union in 1952. There have been three-way ties for gold twice (still possible but very unlikely under current rules): 1948 and 1988.

Games	Gold	Silver	Bronze
1896 Athens	Louis Zutter  Switzerland	Hermann Weingärtner  Germany	Not awarded
1900 Paris	Not held
1904 St. Louis	Anton Heida  United States	George Eyser  United States	William Merz  United States
1908 London	Not held
1912 Stockholm	Not held
1920 Antwerp	Not held
1924 Paris	Josef Wilhelm  Switzerland	Jean Gutweninger  Switzerland	Antoine Rebetez  Switzerland
1928 Amsterdam	Hermann Hänggi  Switzerland	Georges Miez  Switzerland	Heikki Savolainen  Finland
1932 Los Angeles	István Pelle  Hungary	Omero Bonoli  Italy	Frank Haubold  United States
1936 Berlin	Konrad Frey  Germany	Eugen Mack  Switzerland	Albert Bachmann  Switzerland
1948 London	Paavo Aaltonen  Finland Veikko Huhtanen  Finland Heikki Savolainen  Finland	Not awarded	Not awarded
1952 Helsinki	Viktor Chukarin  Soviet Union	Yevgeny Korolkov  Soviet Union Hrant Shahinyan  Soviet Union	Not awarded
1956 Melbourne	Boris Shakhlin  Soviet Union	Takashi Ono  Japan	Viktor Chukarin  Soviet Union
1960 Rome	Eugen Ekman  Finland Boris Shakhlin  Soviet Union	Not awarded	Shuji Tsurumi  Japan
1964 Tokyo	Miroslav Cerar  Yugoslavia	Shuji Tsurumi  Japan	Yury Tsapenko  Soviet Union
1968 Mexico City	Miroslav Cerar  Yugoslavia	Olli Laiho  Finland	Mikhail Voronin  Soviet Union
1972 Munich	Viktor Klimenko  Soviet Union	Sawao Kato  Japan	Eizo Kenmotsu  Japan
1976 Montreal	Zoltán Magyar  Hungary	Eizo Kenmotsu  Japan	Nikolai Andrianov  Soviet Union Michael Nikolay  East Germany
1980 Moscow	Zoltán Magyar  Hungary	Alexander Dityatin  Soviet Union	Michael Nikolay  East Germany
1984 Los Angeles	Li Ning  China Peter Vidmar  United States	Not awarded	Timothy Daggett  United States
1988 Seoul	Lubomir Geraskov  Bulgaria Zsolt Borkai  Hungary Dmitri Bilozertchev  Soviet Union	Not awarded	Not awarded
1992 Barcelona	Vitaly Scherbo  Unified Team Pae Gil-Su  North Korea	Not awarded	Andreas Wecker  Germany
1996 Atlanta	Li Donghua  Switzerland	Marius Urzică  Romania	Alexei Nemov  Russia
2000 Sydney	Marius Urzică  Romania	Eric Poujade  France	Alexei Nemov  Russia
2004 Athens	Teng Haibin  China	Marius Urzică  Romania	Takehiro Kashima  Japan
2008 Beijing	Xiao Qin  China	Filip Ude  Croatia	Louis Smith  Great Britain
2012 London	Krisztián Berki  Hungary	Louis Smith  Great Britain	Max Whitlock  Great Britain
2016 Rio de Janeiro	Max Whitlock  Great Britain	Louis Smith  Great Britain	Alexander Naddour  United States
2020 Tokyo	Max Whitlock  Great Britain	Lee Chih-kai  Chinese Taipei	Kazuma Kaya  Japan
2024 Paris	Rhys McClenaghan  Ireland	Nariman Kurbanov  Kazakhstan	Stephen Nedoroscik  United States

Multiple medalists

The most successful Olympian on pommel horse is Max Whitlock of Great Britain with two gold medals, in 2016 and 2020, and a bronze in 2012. He shares the title of most decorated Olympian on the apparatus, with three Olympic medals, with close contemporary and compatriot Louis Smith with two silvers and a bronze, and Romanian gymnast Marius Urzică, with one gold medal and two silvers. Three other gymnasts have won the gold medal twice: Soviet Boris Shakhlin, Yugoslav Miroslav Cerar, and Hungarian legend Zoltán Magyar.

Rank	Gymnast	Nation	Olympics	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Max Whitlock	Great Britain (GBR)	2012–2020	2	0	1	3
2	Boris Shakhlin	Soviet Union (URS)	1956–1960	2	0	0	2
	Miroslav Cerar	Yugoslavia (YUG)	1964–1968	2	0	0	2
	Zoltán Magyar	Hungary (HUN)	1976–1980	2	0	0	2
5	Marius Urzică	Romania (ROU)	1996–2004	1	2	0	3
6	Viktor Chukarin	Soviet Union (URS)	1952–1956	1	0	1	2
7	Louis Smith	Great Britain (GBR)	2008–2016	0	2	1	3
8	Shuji Tsurumi	Japan (JPN)	1960–1964	0	1	1	2
	Eizo Kenmotsu	Japan (JPN)	1972–1976	0	1	1	2
10	Michael Nikolay	East Germany (GDR)	1976–1980	0	0	2	2
	Alexei Nemov	Russia (RUS)	1996–2000	0	0	2	2

Medalists by country

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Soviet Union (URS)	5	3	4	12
2	Hungary (HUN)	5	0	0	5
3	Switzerland (SUI)	4	3	2	9
4	Finland (FIN)	4	1	1	6
5	China (CHN)	3	0	0	3
6	Great Britain (GBR)	2	2	2	6
7	United States (USA)	2	1	5	8
8	Yugoslavia (YUG)	2	0	0	2
9	Romania (ROU)	1	2	0	3
10	Germany (GER)	1	1	1	3
11	Bulgaria (BUL)	1	0	0	1
	Ireland (IRL)	1	0	0	1
	North Korea (PRK)	1	0	0	1
	Unified Team (EUN)	1	0	0	1
15	Japan (JPN)	0	4	4	8
16	Chinese Taipei (TPE)	0	1	0	1
	Croatia (CRO)	0	1	0	1
	France (FRA)	0	1	0	1
	Italy (ITA)	0	1	0	1
	Kazakhstan (KAZ)	0	1	0	1
21	East Germany (GDR)	0	0	2	2
	Russia (RUS)	0	0	2	2

Gallery

Takashi Ono, 1964

Ivan Ivankov, 2000

Alexander Artemev, 2008

Yang Wei, 2008

Louis Smith, 2016

Artur Davtyan, 2020

Men's Pommel Horse at the Olympics