ROTTERDAM: Japan’s Daiki Hashimoto successfully defended his men’s individual all-around title at the Artistic Gymnastics World Championships in Rotterdam on Thursday ahead of China’s Yang Haonan and Britain's Joe Fraser.
Having already claimed team gold the previous day, the 25-year-old from Narita secured his seventh world title in the Netherlands and his fourth all-around crown in a row.
He took it by a comfortable margin, finishing 1.799pts ahead of Yang. It was the biggest winning margin in a men's all-around at an Olympics or a worlds in 13 years.
Hashimoto is a worthy successor to fellow Japanese, the elegant Kohei Uchimura, who won a record six consecutive world all-around titles between 2009 and 2015.
Initially trailing the unflappable Yang, and despite a modest start on the first two apparatuses (floor exercise and rings), the three-time Olympic champion eventually surged to victory thanks to two outstanding performances on the parallel bars and the horizontal bar.
Reigning Olympic champion Shinnosuke Oka, meanwhile, endured a difficult evening. Two botched landings on vault during the fourth rotation ended his hopes of reaching the podium.
There was even greater disappointment for Russia’s Arsenii Dukhno, who trailed Hashimoto by just one-tenth of a point heading into the final rotation.
A fall on the horizontal bar following a missed grip ended his challenge for gold and even knocked him off the podium altogether, leaving him seventh.
The World Championships continue on Thursday with the women’s individual all-around competition.