Nadia Comaneci scores perfect 10s at the 1976 Montreal Olympics

Competitors applaud Comaneci

20 July 1976

The distinction which Romania’s Nadia Comaneci has received in the team gymnastics championship here is to be applauded by the other participants. Only the great gymnasts have received this accolade in a sport where the competitors are more discriminating than the most pedantic of judges.

But when the 14-year-old European champion received a maximum 10 points for her performance on the asymmetric bars the watching competitors joined the 18,000 crowd in the applause. It is believed to be the first time a perfect score has ever been achieved for any apparatus at the Games. Miss Comaneci’s precision on the beam and floor exercises is exact. She moves with measured care although this is obscured by the ease which is such a feature of her performance. On one handstand she swung her legs overhead so tantalisingly slowly that it seemed as if she did not have the momentum to reach the position. But she did – and then lingered there, as if to emphasise the smoothness of the action before continuing her routine.

Nadia is the flawless gymnast

21 July 1976

Nadia Comaneci, Romania’s European champion, who on Sunday became the first gymnast to score a maximum 10 points on an apparatus at the Olympics, last night repeated the performance on both the beam and asymmetric bars. Her exhibition eclipsed the victory in the women’s gymnastics team competition of the Soviet Union, who have now won every gold medal in this event since they returned to the Games in 1952.

Miss Comaneci’s achievement on Sunday’s compulsory exercises took the results computer unawares. It rejected the 10 points because it was unprecedented in the Games. But even a computer can be persuaded to accept the progress of the sport and there were no such difficulties in recording her perfection in the voluntary exercises.

Miss Comaneci dropped only 0.30 points over the four apparatus on the voluntary movements to lead the qualifiers for tomorrow’s combined exercises final. Even such a dexterous competitor as Olga Korbut lost these many marks on just the vault, when her feet stuttered on landing on one attempt and, on the other, she indecorously fell to the mat.

The Romanian has altered her routines since taking the European championships. Many gymnasts are increasing the tariff rating by attempting more and more intricate routines, but Miss Comaneci completes these with scarcely a blemish. To the untrained observer she appears to make no mistakes.

Ludmila Tourischeva, the 1972 Olympic champion, and another Russian, Nelli Kim, finished equal second, 0.80 points behind Miss Comaneci’s total. It is not that Miss Tourischeva has become slip-shod in her routines or, at 23, and with Olympic world, and European titles behind her, she has lost her incentive. It is rather that Miss Comaneci has brought a new dimension to the sport by invariably being precise in her moves.

The Soviet Union vainly tried to raise the whole hearted support of the crowd – even Miss Tourischeva was eager enough to commit an unusual display of self-advertisement by waving to the crowd. But when she was competing on the beam Miss Comaneci was performing the floor exercises and the applause that greeted the Russian’s fine 9.85 points was perfunctory. Most people’s attention was elsewhere.

And when Miss Comaneci collected her silver medal for the team event, the cheering made the team winners look shamefacedly aside and mutter among themselves.

Youth’s perfect victory

22 July 1976

Nadia Comaneci took the gold medal for the women’s combined exercises with a delightful display of gymnastics here tonight. The 14-year-old Romanian girl finished well ahead of the two leading Russians, Nelli Kim and Ludmila Turischeva, and once again received maximum points, for her routines on the beam and asymmetric bars.

This means that she has now achieved a maximum score five times at the Games, a performance which has never previously been achieved in Olympic gymnastics. But Miss Kim, who took the USSR Cup in May, also was awarded top points after a dextrous turn over the vault and an immaculate landing.

Miss Comaneci has complete confidence in her own ability. But she never indulges herself in it, as Olga Korbut, who finished fifth, has done. She is a harmonious influence on the Romanian team. Even during yesterday’s individual exercises she took time off from concentrating on her own routine to sandpaper the asymmetric bars for her compatriot, Teodora Ungureanu, who finished fourth.

The Guardian, 20 July 1976.