Gymnastics at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Women's balance beam

Women's balance beam competition at the 2008 Summer Olympics was held on August 19 at the Beijing National Indoor Stadium.

Women's balance beam at the Games of the XXIX Olympiad
Venue	Beijing National Indoor Stadium
Dates	August 19
Competitors	8 from 5 nations
Medalists
Shawn Johnson  United States Nastia Liukin  United States Cheng Fei  China
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Main article: Gymnastics at the 2008 Summer Olympics

The eight competitors (with a maximum of two per nation) with the highest scores in qualifying proceeded to the women's balance beam finals. There, each gymnast performed again; the scores from the final round (ignoring qualification) determined final ranking.

Medalists

Gold	Silver	Bronze
Shawn Johnson (USA)	Nastia Liukin (USA)	Cheng Fei (CHN)

Final

Position	Gymnast	Country	A score	B score	Penalty	Total
	Shawn Johnson	United States	7.000	9.225		16.225
	Nastia Liukin	United States	6.600	9.425		16.025
	Cheng Fei	China	6.800	9.150		15.950
4	Anna Pavlova	Russia	6.800	9.100		15.900
5	Gabriela Drăgoi	Romania	6.500	9.125		15.625
6	Li Shanshan	China	7.000	8.300		15.300
7	Ksenia Afanasyeva	Russia	5.800	9.025		14.825
8	Koko Tsurumi	Japan	6.300	8.150		14.450

Qualified competitors

Position	Gymnast	A score[1]	B score	Penalty	Total
1	Li Shanshan (CHN)	7.000	9.125		16.125
2	Nastia Liukin (USA)	6.600	9.375		15.975
3	Shawn Johnson (USA)	6.900	9.075		15.975
4	Cheng Fei (CHN)	6.700	9.275	0.100	15.875
5	Anna Pavlova (RUS)	6.700	9.125		15.825
6	Ksenia Afanasyeva (RUS)	6.600	9.175		15.775
7	Gabriela Drăgoi (ROU)	6.500	8.950		15.450
8	Koko Tsurumi (JPN)	6.500	8.925		15.425

Only two gymnasts per country may advance to an event final. The following gymnasts scored high enough to qualify, but did not do so because two gymnasts from their country had already qualified ahead of them:

•  Alicia Sacramone (USA) (4th place)
•  Ksenia Semenova (RUS) (8th place)
•  Deng Linlin (CHN) (9th place)
•  Bridget Sloan (USA) (10th place)
•  Yang Yilin (CHN) (11th place)

The eventual final qualifier had the 13th highest balance beam score overall during qualification.

References

Notes

1. Scoring in artistic gymnastics is based on two separate scores that are then combined in order to come to the final score. The A score measures the difficulty of each element (and combinations of elements) within the routine, while the B score evaluates the performance, ie, the "execution, composition and artistry" of the routine. For further information, please see the Code of Points article.

Sources

• Balance beam final results
• Balance beam qualification results
• NYT Report