Fifty-year-old Henrietta Ónodi is an Olympic champion gymnast, the primary European champion of Hungarian girls’s gymnastics, honorary citizen of Békéscsaba.
He was born on Could 22, 1974 in Békéscsaba. From the age of 5, he did gymnastics at Előre Spartacus in Békéscsaba, and as a diligent scholar of the Unyatyinszky couple, he developed into an actual basic. In 1986, he was fourth on the beam on the European Junior Championships, in 1988 he gained the grasp’s Hungarian championship in 4 figures, and on the European Youth Championships he took third place on the half-bar. He was barely 14 years outdated when he already knew a component on the beam that nobody else on the earth might, it was later named following him – it’s no marvel that his expertise was additionally seen in the USA, which turned one of many nice powers of the game following the arrival of Béla Károlyi. Within the yr of the 1988 Seoul Olympics, he was the Hungarian champion all 4 instances, however he mightn’t make it to the five-hoop video games due to the age restrict.
He broke into the highest of the world on the age of 15, rising to the highest of the competitors along with his motion and radiance. On the World Championships in Stuttgart in 1989, she was fifth on beam, and in the identical yr, on the European Championships in Brussels, she gained the primary gold medal of Hungarian girls’s gymnastics on the half hurdle, gained the bronze medal on the ground, and was fifth within the particular person all-around. He didn’t defend his title on the 1990 European Championships in Athens, however returned residence with bronze medals within the particular person all-around and ground.
On the 1991 World Championships in Indianapolis, the soar – which was nonetheless referred to as horse leaping – turned her strongest efficiency, during which she gained a silver medal. In line with his phrases, he labored exhausting for achievement: along with college, he nearly solely went to coaching classes, each minute was allotted, and he hardly had any free time left.
He managed to comprehend his life’s nice dream on the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, when he gained a gold medal in horse leaping. Within the remaining, she obtained 9.925 factors for her train, the identical because the Romanian Lavinia Milosovici, who got here following her, so each of them might stand on high of the rostrum – Hungarian girls’s gymnastics turned the Olympic champion once more following 36 years. The competitors was additionally determined between the 2 of them on the ground, the place the Romanian lady obtained the utmost ten factors, thus profitable with 5 hundredths of some extent, though many believed that Henrietta Ónodi deserved the gold medal as nicely. It was solely when he bought residence and noticed the quantity of consideration directed at him that he understood how a lot he had achieved and the way in style he had turn out to be.
After the Olympics, he went to check in the USA and deliberate to complete competing, however he was once more a member of the Hungarian crew on the 1996 pentathlon video games in Atlanta and completed ninth. The next yr, he was nonetheless within the seventh crew on the Universiade, following which he retired for good, ending his profession as a 38-time Hungarian champion.
His sports activities profession was acknowledged with quite a few awards: in 1988 he was a superb youth athlete, from 1989 he was the perfect Hungarian gymnast of the yr for 4 years in a row, in 1992 he obtained the Small Cross of the Order of Advantage of the Republic of Hungary, in 1992 the Gold Medal of the President of the Republic of Hungary, in 1995 the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Hungarian Truthful Play Award. In 2008, he was elected an honorary citizen of Békéscsaba, in 2010 he was included within the membership of the immortals of the Hungarian Gymnastics Affiliation, and he was elected to the American-based corridor of fame of the immortals of gymnastics. In 2017, he obtained the title of immortal sports activities star of Békéscsaba.
Though he had deliberate to return residence following graduating and set up a coaching heart in Békéscsaba, this didn’t happen because of the sudden dying of his father. He stayed in the USA, labored within the workplace of the World Olympic Affiliation in Miami, following which turned a coach in Minneapolis. Right now, she lives along with her husband, Olympic pentathlete and physician Jim Haley, and their three youngsters in a small city in Florida. He hasn’t misplaced contact with sports activities, he follows the occasions, usually visits Békéscsaba and writes regarding his experiences.
Supply: MTI
