Artur Dalaloyan who competed on all six events today only 3.5 months after tearing his Achilles, credited hard work and the support of his family and team with his miraculous recovery:
“My wife played a very big role in my recovery. The moment I got injured, she and our team doctor took me to the hospital together. When my leg was hanging loose, I had a full Achilles tear, I couldn’t move it, nothing. But Olga said: “calm down, it’s a sport, it’s not a big deal, it will all pass. Right now you just need to focus as much as possible on the recovery, on the work, take it easy and not to dig a pit in your head, take it easier.”
“I have just been working for 24 hours a day. The Olympic Games mean a lot to me. Many athletes don’t get to go to the Olympic Games even once in their lives. But thanks to the support of my family, my loved ones, wife, kids, the support of the whole team, I managed to find strength and start working right after I had surgery. When I came here, I felt like a complete gymnast, that I can do everything [on all events]. I’ve done the most possible amount of work, I’ve been working on my recovery for every second of every day.”
Nikita Nagorny said the rest of the team were aware of Dalaloyan’s decision to do all-around and supported him:
“We had a team meeting yesterday where we discussed everything. It wasn’t a spontaneous decision, he prepared, he trained, throughout all this time he trained at home as well and tumbled. We all knew that we would come here and he would try doing [vault and floor]. So, it wasn’t a secret for us.”
Dalaloyan originally said he might do vault and floor in the qualification but didn’t plan on doing them in the team final. However, his scores on these events today were high enough to count towards the team score and, according to Abliazin, Dalaloyan might be used on these events in the team final as well:
“Artur did a good job, he’s a fighter, he showed that he really can do the all-around. Now we’ll decide on the three people [on each event] in the final a bit differently, because today, he also did vault well. So, we’ll rethink everything for the team final.”
Belyavskiy thinks that the team’s support helps Dalaloyan to get through his routines:
“We are all supporting him how we can. It’s his decision [to compete on vault and floor]. I think that he feels our support and draws energy from it when he does the routines.”
Photo: Russian Artistic Gymnastics Federation
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