European Victories for Romanian Sports
50 years after Nadia Comăneci won her first European medals, a new star of Romanian gymnastics is rising
Florin Orban, 02.06.2025, 14:00
The week that has just ended brought Romanian athletes as many as 11 medals. Four of them came at the European Artistic Gymnastics Championships, held in Leipzig, Germany, while 7 others were won by the rowing team taking part in the European Championships that came to a close in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
The last Romanian gymnast to win 4 individual medals at a European Championship was Larisa Iordache, 12 years ago in Moscow. In this year’s competition in Leipzig, the performance was replicated by Ana Maria Bărbosu. She was 3rd in the all-around and uneven bars events, 2nd on beam and the best in Europe on floor. She narrowly missed out on a 5th medal, with the Romanian team, which finished fourth in the nations’ finals.
Ana’s performance confirms her status as the best Romanian gymnast in recent years and the only medallist in last year’s Olympic Games in Paris, where she won bronze on floor. Her result in Leipzig comes exactly 50 years after the first great performance of Romanian gymnastics in a European Championship. In May 1975, in Skien, Norway, Nadia Comăneci took part in top-level international competitions for the first time, and won the European gold in the all-around, vault, uneven bars and beam events, while also ranking second on floor.
The second competition in which Romanian athletes had a stellar performance last week took place in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. The Romanian team won 7 medals, of which 3 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze. The first day of the finals, Saturday, was also the richest, with 6 medals. Magdalena Rusu and Simona Radiș won the first European title in the women’s double sculls, with a new European record. Romania’s men’s double sculls team, namely Florin Arteni and Florin Lehaci, also broke a European record. A 3rd gold medal was brought by the men’s four-sculls crew, made up of Ștefan Berariu, Sergiu Bejan, Andrei Mândrilă and Ciprian Tudosă.
In the men’s double sculls, Olympic champions Andrei Cornea and Marian Enache won the silver, as did the women’s 4-sculls crew, comprising Adriana Adam, Maria Lehaci, Ancuța Bodnar and Amalia Bereș. In the women’s double sculls, Andrada Moroșanu and Mariana Dumitru, who represented Romania for the first time at a top-level competition, won the bronze. The last bronze medal for the Romanian team came on Sunday thanks to Mihai Chiruță in the men’s singles event.
Also on Sunday, we were expecting a medal from the women’s 8+1 crew, which has dominated international competitions for years and is the defending Olympic champion. However, the girls missed the podium, arriving seven seconds behind Great Britain, the winning boat. In the end, with the 7 medals it won, Romania came out third in the nations’ hierarchy, after the British and German teams. (AMP)
