Japanese teenager Daiki Hashimoto had no time for tears as he became the youngest ever men’s all-round Olympic gymnastics champion with a superb final horizontal bars routine at the Tokyo Games on Wednesday.
The nerveless 19-year-old edged out China’s Xiao Ruoteng with Russian world champion Nikita Nagornyy taking bronze, and kept dry-eyed on the podium despite the enormity of his accomplishment.
“Had I cried, I thought it would have been as if I were feeling satisfied with where I am now. I thought the champion must not cry but only look forward,” he said.
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The boy from the Tokyo suburbs succeeds his illustrious compatriot Kohei Uchimura, the 2012 and 2016 all-round champion who chose not to go for a hat-trick after persistent shoulder injuries.
Placed third going into the final rotation, the horizontal bar, Hashimoto seized his moment, putting in a near-flawless routine, dismounting…