The Egyptians, Romans and Greeks included exercises and acrobatics from the backs of horses as part of their military training and for amusement. They wrote stories and made pictures of these activities and arecould be considered the first gymnasts by many people. By the late 1700s, Gymnastics started to shape into a sport. in the late 1700’s. In 1774, a German Saxon named Johann Bernhard Basedow was recorded to include various physical exercises at his school in Dessau. Shortly thereafter, a man named Jahn Friedrich Ludwig, another German teacher, constructed basic devices that became the basis for the gymnastics equipment now used throughout the world. LudwigHe is thought to be the founder of gymnastics. Janh's followers organized clubs…show more content… In 1972, a tiny 17 year old from Minsk, Belarus burst onto the Olympic scene and changed the sport forever. Her name is Olga Korbut. She changed the course from elegant, artistic movement, to athletic, acrobatic maneuvers. In addition to winning 3 gold medals, Olga Korbut introduced her iconic Korbut flip. The skill, performed on the bars, was comprised of standing on the high bar, flipping backwards, and catching the bar again. The skill was subsequently banned from the sport because it was too dangerous. As a result of Korbut’s meteoric rise, the sport of gymnastics became an overnight international phenomenon with participants flocking to gyms all over the world. The physiology of the typical female gymnast became younger and smaller. As 1972 was at the height of the cold war, Korbut who was introduced to president Nixon told the press that Nixon credited her with doing more for East/West diplomacy than years of diplomatic meetings were able to achieve. Images of the emotional pig-tailed, Russian pixie humanized western conceptions of a stoic, cold, and faceless Russia. Subsequently, in 1976, 14-year-old Romanian Nadia Comaneci was the first Olympian to receive a perfect score of 10.0 in the Olympic games. Nadia scored a perfect 10.0 seven times during the games and received 3 gold medals. In recent years, American women have taken the spotlight away from the eastern Europeans with stars including Mary Lou Retton, Kerry Strugg, Shawn Johnson, Nastia Luikin, Gabby Douglas, (and my teammate) Aly Raisman. Arguably, the U.S.A has become the focal point of the sport. It will be interesting to see how the sport changes and how up and coming athletes will continue to challenge the existing
