is a Japanese retired artistic gymnast. He is a seven-time Olympic medalist (team, all-around and floor exercise), winning three golds and four silvers, and a 21-time World medalist (team, all-around, floor exercise, parallel bars and the horizontal bar).
Uchimura was already considered by many in the sport to be one of the greatest gymnasts of all time after he completely dominated to unprecedented levels in all the major competitions for the entire quad, and finally finishing the season by winning the Olympic individual all-around gold medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. However, he then extended those accomplishments even further when he followed it up with continued and uninterrupted victories of every major competition again throughout the next Olympic cycle, replicating the feat he achieved in the last quad, which led him to win two additional gold medals on team and individual all-around at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Uchimura is known for being the first gymnast (male or female) to capture every major all-around title in an entire single Olympic cycle, accomplishing this feat twice by securing six world (2009–2011 and 2013–2015) and two Olympic (2012 London Olympics, and 2016 Rio Olympics) individual all-around titles. Uchimura also took the individual all-around silver medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. He is known for delivering difficult and accurately executed routines. The International Gymnast Magazine had praised his skills as a "combination of tremendous difficulty, supreme consistency and extraordinary elegance of performance."
Early life and career Uchimura was born in Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture, and began gymnastics at age 3 at his parents' sports club in Nagasaki Prefecture. His parents, Kazuhisa and Shuko Uchimura, were both competitive gymnasts.Goldsea Asian American News Kohei Uchimura seen as the most dominant athlete at London At age 15, he moved to Tokyo to train with Athens gold medalist Naoya Tsukahara.100 Olympic Athletes To Watch, TIME 100 Olympic Athletes to Watch, July 24, 2008 His younger sister Haruhi Uchimura is also a gymnast. Kōhei Uchimura stated of his beliefs, "I don’t believe in God. I never had lucky charms. All I believe in is practice." In his first international event, the 2005 International Junior Competition in Japan,International Gymnastics Federation Athletes Profiles: Kohei Uchimura he competed outside official competition.Japan Gymnastics Association Results, 2005 International Junior Competition. jpn-gym.or.jp
Senior career
2007 Uchimura joined the Japanese national squad in 2007, making his senior debut at the 2007 Paris World Cup in March, a major international competition. He took the bronze medal on vault, plus placed 9th on floor exercise here.Gymnastics Results 16th Internationaux de France, Paris-Bercy 2007 In August at the 2007 Summer Universiade in Bangkok, he won the team title,International Gymnast Japanese Men Take Universiade Team Title and individual gold and bronze on respective floor exercise and vault.International Gymnast Ukraine Biggest Winner In Universiade Event Finals At Japan's National Championships in October, he got 7th on individual all-around.Gymnastics Results 61st Japanese National Championships, Tokyo, October 2007 A month later at the international "Good Luck Beijing" event, he won team silver with Japan's team, and ranked 7th on floor exercise.Gymnastics Results Good Luck Beijing, Beijing 2007
2008 Uchimura started the 2008 season by winning gold on floor at the World Cup in Tianjin in May.Gymnastics Results FIG 2008 Artistic Gymnastics World Cup, Tianjin
Later that summer, he was selected to represent Japan at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing as a member of the national team. At the Olympics, he contributed to the team silver by competing on floor, vault, parallel bars, and high bar. He qualified for the all-around final, where he won the silver medal. His 2nd place win behind China's Yang Wei gave Japan its first Olympic medal in the event in 24 years.The Japan Times Online Uchimura earns silver in all-around He obtained the highest mark of that meet on the floor 15.825 (double Arabian piked half out, triple twist dismount) and had a spectacular high bar routine (Kolman, piked Kovacs).International Gymnast Magazine, "Yang's Way" Christian Ivanov, page 30-31, October 2008 He also qualified through to the floor final, where he placed fifth.
At the Japanese national championships that year, the 19-year-old Uchimura racked up the highest scores on floor exercise and pommel horse en route to winning his first national all around title. He was the first teenager in 12 years to win the Japanese men's national title.International Gymnast Magazine Uchimura wins Japanese title, Ayako Murao, November 2008
2009 In October 2009, Uchimura competed at the 2009 World Championships. Here, he dominated both the qualifications and the all around final. He won the all around title by a margin of 2.575 points ahead of Daniel Keatings, marking top scores for floor, rings, vault, and horizontal bar.International Gymnast Magazine, "Untouchable", by Dwight Normile, page 36-38, December 2009 Uchimura placed fourth on floor and sixth on high bar as well.
He appeared on the cover of the December 2009 number of the International Gymnastics Magazine which was entitled "Uchimura rules".
2010
In October 2010, Uchimura went to the 2010 World Championships again as a member of Japan's national team. As in 2009, he dominated the all-around prelims and finals, taking his second consecutive all-around title by a margin of 2.251 points ahead of Philipp Boy. In the all-around final, he had the top score of the day on floor, and highest execution mark (9.666) for a Yurchenko 2½ twists on vault. He contributed to Japan's team silver medal by competing in the team final on all events except still rings too. He qualified for two event finals, winning silver on floor, and bronze on parallel bars.
2011
On October 14, 2011, Uchimura won the all-around final for the third time at the 2011 World Championships in Tokyo, Japan. With a score of 93.631 points, Uchimura won by a margin of 3.101 points, roughly the same margin that separated second and fourteenth place. Not only is he the first male gymnast to win three individual all-around titles, but Uchimura is also the first gymnast, male or female, to win three consecutive individual all-around titles.
In the all-around final, Uchimura recorded the highest score on four of the six events: floor exercise, still rings, parallel bars, and pommel horse (he tied for the highest score on pommel horse). Uchimura also qualified for five of the six individual apparatus finals, all except vault. He won his first World Championship gold medal on floor exercise, as well as a bronze medal on high bar and the silver medal with the Japanese team.
At the 2011 Worlds, Uchimura also won the Longines Prize for Elegance along with Romania's Ana Porgras. The prize is given at each World Championships to the male and female gymnasts who demonstrate "the most remarkable elegance". The winners were unanimously declared by a panel of judges, where both Uchimura and Porgras were each awarded a trophy, a Longines watch, and US$5,000.43rd Artistic Gymnastics World Championships (Tokyo, Japan). longines.com (October 7–16, 2011) He was especially pleased to win this award since he collects watches.
In November 2011, Uchimura won four gold medals at the 65th Japanese Championships. Besides all-around, he also took titles on half the apparatuses: floor exercise, pommel horse, and high bar.International Gymnast Magazine Online – Uchimura Unstoppable at Japanese Championships. Intlgymnast.com (November 7, 2011). Retrieved on 2016-08-11.
2012 Uchimura competed in the London 2012 Olympics in London and fell several times in qualifications, which put him in ninth place among the group of qualifiers for the individual all-around final. In the men's team gymnastics final, Uchimura fell from the pommel horse during his dismount. The Japanese coaches appealed the scoring on this performance as he still landed on his feet and felt it should have counted as a full dismount, albeit with a large penalty. Before the appeal, Great Britain were to get the silver and Ukraine the bronze, but the appeal pushed Japan's points total up to secure the silver behind China, which pushed Great Britain down to the bronze.
In the men's individual all-around final, Uchimura dominated the competition and won the gold medal with a score of 92.690. He also won the silver medal in the men's floor exercise event final with a score of 15.800, thanks to the tie-breaking procedure. It was automatically triggered due to his second highest combined score in the final tying the one by Denis Ablyazin of Russia, who did have the highest difficulty score of 7.1 among all finalists due to more passes. Unfortunately when there is a tie, the gymnast instead with the higher execution score will place ahead, which was Uchimura who posted the highest execution of 9.100 in the final.
2013 During qualifications Uchimura dominated, garnering an all-around total of 91.924, which was 2.392 points ahead of the closest competitor. He qualified for the floor exercise finals in third place with a 15.333, first for the parallel bars final with 15.400, and third for the high bar final with a 15.658. He qualified as a reserve for the pommel horse final with a 15.133.
Uchimura won a record fourth consecutive all-around gold medal at the 2013 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Antwerp. Uchimura finished with 91.990 points, almost two points ahead of the next nearest competitor. Uchimura also won bronze medals on floor exercise (15.500) behind Japan's 17-year-old newcomer Kenzō Shirai (16.000) and Jacob Dalton of the United States (15.600), and the horizontal bar (15.633) behind Epke Zonderland of the Netherlands (16.000) and Fabian Hambüchen of Germany (15.933), as well as a gold medal for parallel bars (15.666). His total of four individual medals is the highest number of medals Uchimura has earned at a single World Championships.
2014 On October 9, 2014, Uchimura once again made history, winning a record fifth consecutive world championship all-around gold at Nanning. He totaled 91.965 points, 1.492 points above Great Britain's Max Whitlock to capture the title.Johnson, Raphielle. (October 9, 2014) Kohei Uchimura, greatest ever after 5th World Championship? – OlympicTalk. Olympictalk.nbcsports.com. Retrieved on 2016-08-11.
Uchimura also secured the silver on the horizontal bar apparatus after he posted scores that sandwiched them between those by Epke Zonderland (Netherlands), who won the gold, and Marijo Možnik (Croatia), who took the bronze.
2015 On October 30, 2015, Uchimura won a record sixth all-around world gymnastics championship title, achieving a total score of 92.332, more than 1.6 points ahead of Cuban teenager Manrique Larduet and Deng Shudi of China.
Uchimura started off on the floor with a 15.733, and led Deng by 0.600 after the first rotation. Then on pommel horse, he scored a 15.100. He would continued with a 14.933 on rings, 15.633 on vault, and 15.833 on parallel bars before wrapping things up with a 15.100 on the horizontal bar, one of his best apparatuses, on which he had also taken a fall, just a few days before in the team competition.
Uchimura would then go on to win the horizontal bar apparatus final as well with a score of 15.833 ahead of Danell Leyva (United States) and Larduet.
However, what was even more significant was that Uchimura led Japan to victory in the team event final where they defeated Great Britain and China. This was their first team gold since the 1978 World Championships in Strasbourg.
2016