You Too Can Become an Expert in Pommel Horse

By now you’ve probably figured out that Pommel Horse Guy isn’t some obscure species of centaur, but Stephen Nedoroscik, the gymnast who has emerged as a main character of the Paris Olympic Games after helping USA clinch the bronze in the men’s gymnastics team final Monday night. The 25-year-old with an electrical engineering degree and glasses that he slips off when called on to execute superhuman feats is giving the internet major Clark Kent vibes. He can also solve a Rubik’s cube in under 10 seconds.

But his most unique talent is that he’s an apparatus specialist—unlike his teammates who perform in multiple events, Nedoroscik competes solely in the pommel horse. He’s that good. On Saturday, he’ll be competing for another medal in the men’s pommel horse final—and the eyes of the world (or at least the extremely online) will be watching.

But with great power comes great responsibility. On Monday, that meant Nedoroscik had to sit quietly on the sidelines for almost three hours, at times with his head back and eyes closed (much to the internet’s glee) while his teammates went through multiple rotations. When his number was finally called, Nedoroscik was ready. His teammates screamed “Let’s go!” from the sidelines as Nedoroscik delivered a clean, 35-second routine of mesmerizing scissor single-leg swings and double-leg circles that looked like an especially elegant breakdance. As he dismounted, a smile crept across his mouth before his feet even touched the mat.

The bronze ends a 16-year medal drought for US men’s gymnastics—but judging from how his teammates hoisted up Nedoroscik as they ecstatically bounced up and down, they might as well have won all the golds. It was the kind of dopamine-inducing moment people come to the Olympics to see, rekindling faith in camaraderie and perseverance. Given America’s fractured politics, viewers can marvel at what we can achieve with true collaboration—and the pommel horse.

The pommel horse goes way back, as in: It’s literally ancient. While early Greek civilization invented the Olympics, it was the Romans who invented a wooden horse soldiers could use to practice mounting and dismounting. The “pommels,” or the handles the gymnasts grip, derive their name from the Old French word for “rounded knob” and share the same root as pomme, the French word for apple. According to Merriam-Webster, it wasn’t until around 1908, some 12 years after the modern Olympics began, that the term pommel horse came into use.

Only men’s gymnastics teams compete in this event. Female gymnasts compete in four apparatuses: floor, vault, beam, and uneven bars. Men also do floor and vault, but diverge on the remaining four events: parallel bars, horizontal bar, rings, and pommel horse. And while the US women’s team is clearly dominating on their own apparatuses—they won gold in the team final on Tuesday by nearly six points!—it would be awesome to see Simone Biles take on the pommel horse one day, just to see what she can do.

Even Biles might not be overconfident about her abilities on this apparatus, though. The pommel horse is known for being a heartbreaker, something gymnasts often fall off of. Variously described as “bedeviling” and “notorious,” pommel horse is a skill that requires technique, focus, and grace as much as it does strength, since the slightest flagging or loss of control can result in disaster. Case in point: In the men’s all-around final on Wednesday, US’s Frederick Richard fell off the horse in the first rotation, attributing the blunder to a “weird slip.” The way “weird” has been deployed lately, you’d almost think he was implying there was something sinister about the pommel horse. To be fair, Japan’s Daiki Hashimoto—the reigning Olympic champion, also fell during his turn.

But the apparatus is especially haunting for the US. Before Nedoroscik won gold at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in 2021, an American hadn’t medaled on the pommel for 15 years, and had never won a world title. Americans haven’t won Olympic medals in pommel horse since 1984, when members of Team USA won both gold and bronze.

Let’s hope Nedoroscik can end yet another dry spell on Saturday—and, if it’s not asking too much, also furnish us with some new meme material. But even if he falls short, it’ll be okay because he’s already accomplished the unimaginable: taking the pommel horse mainstream. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope. It’s Pommel Horse Guy.