Denis Ablyazin


Denis Mikhailovich Ablyazin is a Russian artistic gymnast. He is a five-time medalist at the Olympic Games. At the 2012 London Olympics he won silver in vault and bronze in floor. At the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, he won silver with the Russian men's team, a silver in vault and bronze in rings.
He is also three-time European vault champion, the 2014 European champion on floor and rings and the 2014 World Champion on floor.

Personal life

Ablyazin was born on 3 August 1992 in Penza, Russia. As a child, he practiced ice hockey with the goal of becoming a hockey player. He also tried cycling and playing football.
In September 2016, Ablyazin married Ksenia Semyonova, a Russian former gymnast who won two World titles. On January 21, 2017, their son, Yaroslav Ablyazin, was born. Denis and Ksenia separated in 2018.

Career

After trying multiple sports as a child, Ablyazin finally chose artistic gymnastics, the sport he excelled in the most. The sport truly appealed to him after he brought home a gold medal from a youth version of the sports festival, Spartakiad, hosted by his primary school in Chelyabinsk, Russia.

2011

In March, Ablyazin competed at Artistic Gymnastics World Cup in Cottbus, Germany. In the event finals he placed fourth on floor with a score of 14.925 and third on vault with a score of 16.050. In April, he competed at the European Championships in Berlin, Germany, where he finished sixth in the floor exercise final, scoring 15.250.
In October, Ablyazin competed at the World Championships in Tokyo, Japan. He contributed scores of a 15.033 on floor, 15.000 on rings and 16.266 on vault toward the Russian team's fourth-place finish. Individually, he placed fifth in the vault final with a score of 16.174, after qualifying in ninth place and being brought in as a reserve when Marian Dragulescu of Romania withdrew from the competition due to injury.

2012

In May, Ablyazin was selected, alongside Emin Garibov, David Belyavskiy, Anton Golotsutskov and Aleksandr Balandin to represent Russia at the 2012 European Championships in Montpellier, France. He contributed scores of a 15.266 on floor, 15.241 on rings and 16.066 on vault toward Russia's second-place finish. He won two bronze medals in the rings and vault finals, scoring a 15.433 on rings and 16.062 on vault.

2012 London Olympics

Ablyazin competed for the national team at the 2012 Summer Olympics in the men's artistic team all-around. He was the only Russian male artistic gymnast to win two medals, a bronze on floor and a silver on vault behind Yang Hak-Seon of South Korea, at the 2012 Summer Olympics. On the floor, his score tied him for the second-highest score of the night with Kohei Uchimura of Japan and only Zou Kai of China had surpassed him. However, after applying tie breaking rules in gymnastics for the Olympics, Uchimura ended up with the silver and relegated Ablyazin to the bronze. With a D-score of 7.1 on floor, he also executed the most difficult routine during the event final with an extra pass and barely finished his routine in time, right at the sound of the final warning bell indicating his time was over.

2013

In March, Ablyazin competed at the World Cup, which was held in France, where he won gold on rings and placed second on floor. In April, he won the gold medal in the vault final at the 2013 European Championships in Moscow, Russia, scoring 15.408.
In July, Ablyazin, alongside the Russian team competed at the 2013 Summer Universiade in Kazan, Russia, where they won the gold medal, ahead of Ukraine and Japan. In the event finals, he placed second both on rings and vault.
In September, Ablyazin competed at the World Championships in Antwerp, Belgium, but failed to qualify in any event finals. There was no team event in 2013 as is customary at the worlds held immediately following an Olympic year.

2014

At the start of the season, Ablyazin competed at the World Cup in Cottbus, Germany and placed first in the rings and floor finals. In May, he and his teammates, competed at the 2014 European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria. Ablyazin contributed scores of 15.833 on floor, 15.500 on rings, 15.366 on vault toward Russia's first-place finish with a total score of 267.959, ahead of Great Britain. Individually, Ablyazin placed first in all events he qualified, winning the gold medal on floor with a score of 15.700, on rings, scoring 15.800 and on vault with a total score of 15.150.
Ablyazin won a total of four gold medals making him the most successful gymnast in the entire 2014 European Championships. He was the first gymnast to win four gold medals in a single European Championships since Marian Dragulescu in 2004.
In October, Ablyazin competed at the 2014 World Championships in Nanning, China and helped the Russian team to a fifth-place finish. In the apparatus finals, Ablyazin had qualified for three events. Ablyazin even surprised himself to finish ahead of defending champion Kenzō Shirai of Japan and win his first gold medal on floor, scoring 15.750, with just 0.017 difference in their scores, after Shirai stepped out-of-bounds in his third pass and incurred a 0.1 point penalty. Ablyazin's routine in that floor final had the second-highest difficulty score of 7.1 behind Shirai's 7.4, and they were the only two finalist who had difficult values that scored above 7.0. Ablyazin also took home the bronze medal for rings with a score of 15.700. Although he had also qualified to the vault final, he fell on both vaults and finished in eighth place.

2016

On May 25–29, Ablyazin won Russia the Team gold at the 2016 European Championships, he qualified to two apparatus finals taking silver in Ring and finished seventh in Vault.
On August 6–16, Ablyazin competed with the Russian Team at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, he contributed scores of 15.100 in floor, 15.700 in rings, 15.600 vault, helping the Russian men's team win the silver medal with a total of 271.453 points. Ablyazin also qualified to two apparatus finals where he won bronze in rings and silver in vault behind Ri Se Gwang.

2017

Ablyazin took a hiatus after the Olympic season to recover from sustained ankle injuries and spent time with his new son Yaroslav. On August 23–27, Ablyazin returned to competition at the Russian Cup where he won bronze in the team event and gold in rings.
On October 2–8, 2017, Ablyazin competed at the 2017 World Championships in Montreal, Canada and finished with only one medal, a silver in the individual still rings event final with a combined score of 15.333 behind the 15.433 posted by the gold medallist Eleftherios Petrounias of Greece. As is customary again, no team event was held at this world championships due to 2016 being an Olympic year.

Competitive history

YearEventTeamAAFXPHSRVTPBHB
2011National Championships1st3rd7th
2011European Championships6th
2011World Championships4th5th
2012National Championships2nd1st3rd1st
2012European Championships2nd6th3rd3rd
2012Olympic Games6th3rd5th2nd
2013National Championships2nd1st1st1st
2013European Championships5th1st
2013Universiade1st7th2nd2nd
2013World Championships
2014National Championships1st1st2nd1st
2014European Championships1st1st1st1st
2014World Championships5th1st3rd8th
2015National Championships3rd1st1st1st
2015European Championships2nd2nd
2015World Championships4th6th
2016National Championships1st2nd1st1st
2016European Championships1st2nd7th
2016Olympic Games2nd3rd2nd
2017Russian Cup3rd4th1st5th
2017World Championships2nd