Many artistic gymnasts skip the opening ceremony at the Olympics because their competition often starts the next day or a couple of days after and participating in the ceremony is tiring. There are some exceptions – for example, this year Eleftherios Petrounias and Oksana Chusovitina will be flag-bearers for their countries.
Valentina Rodionenko told TASS that neither MAG nor WAG teams will take part in the opening ceremony in order to rest before the competition:
“The team will not participate in the athletes’ parade during the opening ceremony. This isn’t because we don’t want to risk the health of our athletes in the pandemic. The next day after the ceremony, our competition will start. Artistic gymnastics almost always opens the Olympics and we skipped the opening ceremonies at all the previous Games as well. We are fine, all the athletes are healthy and ready to compete”.
