Dutch gymnast
Epke Jan Zonderland (born 16 April ) is a Dutch artistic gymnast and the Olympic gold medallist on high bar. He is a 4-time Olympian (–20) and has also taken 3 World Championships golds on high bar at the , and World Championships, the first man to secure this feat on that apparatus. He is nicknamed "The Flying Dutchman.”
Zonderland was born on 16 April in Lemmer, Netherlands. He started gymnastics at the age of four. He has two brothers (Herre and Johan) and one sister (Geeske) who are also international gymnasts.[2]
Zonderland enrolled to study medicine at the University of Groningen in He took 12 years to complete his degree in medicine as he was pursuing his career in gymnastics at the same time, and qualified as a medical doctor in [3]
Zonderland reached his first international success as a junior in At the European Junior Championships in Ljubljana he was fourth in the all-around event and he won a silver medal on the horizontal bar.[2] That same year he also became Dutch national all-around champion by taking over the title from his older brother Herre.[2]
In at the World Championships in Melbourne, Zonderland and Jeffrey Wammes were the first ever Dutch gymnasts in the history of the sport to qualify for the all-around final.[4] Zonderland eventually ended up in the 11th position.[2] In that same year at the European Championships he finished 15th, which was a disappointment considering his World Championship result.[2]
After his success in he continued in by reaching the final of the horizontal bar competition during the European Championships in Volos, where he was 6th.[2] At the World Cup meeting in Glasgow on the same discipline he won the silver medal and in Tehran, Zonderland claimed his first World Cup win and the gold medal.[2] That year he also became Dutch national all-around champion for the second time in his career.[2]
In he competed in both the European and the World Championships. At the European Championships in Amsterdam he finished sixth in the individual all-around (IAA) event, the highest ever position by a Dutch gymnast.[2] During the same Championships he also won the bronze medal on the parallel bars. Later, in September at the World Championships in Stuttgart Zonderland finished 4th on the horizontal bar, which earned him a qualification for the Summer Olympics in Beijing.[2][5] Later in he won his second World Cup event at the horizontal bar in Glasgow.[2]
At the Summer Olympics, Zonderland reached the high bar final in which he finished seventh.
In , he won the silver medal on high bar at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. At the World Championships in Rotterdam, he earned another silver medal on high bar. In he became European champion for the first time.
At the Summer Olympics, Zonderland won an Olympic gold medal in the high bar with a personal best score of His routine included a triple combo of Cassina-Kovacs-Kolman, then the most difficult release combination.[6][7] His performance was regarded by many as one of the top performances of the games.[8][9][10] The first Dutch gymnast (male or female) to win an individual Olympic medal, he also won the first Olympic gymnastics medal in 84 years for the Netherlands.[11]
At the World Championships in Antwerp, Zonderland became world champion for the first time.[12][13] He performed a double combo of Cassina-Kovacs followed by Kolman-Gaylord 2 with a stuck double-twisting double layout dismount.[14]
In , Zonderland won the championship title again on high bar at the European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria.[15] He also successfully defended his world title at the World Gymnastics Championships in Nanning, China.[16]
In April , Zonderland failed to defend the European title after falling off the high bar.[17] In August , he fell in training, which left him with a concussion and an injury to his thumb.[18] The injury curtailed his training times and he failed to make the final to defend his world title at the World Championship in Glasgow.[19]
In , Zonderland sprained his fingers again during training in June, just before the Summer Olympics.[18] He failed to defend his Olympic title at the Olympics after falling in his high bar routine.[20]
On 16–17 September , Zonderland competed at the Paris Challenge Cup in France where he won gold in the high bar individual event, scoring He then competed at the World Championships in Montreal. In the high bar event final, he caught the bar with just one hand after a flight element, but managed to stay on with only his right hand to swing into a giant despite glaring leg separation, and successfully finished his routine. He earned a silver medal, scoring [21]
On 9–12 August Zonderland competed at the European Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Glasgow, Scotland, where he won the silver medal—thanks heavily to his top D-score of that was at least ½ a point more than the next highest finalist's D-score—behind Oliver Hegi of Switzerland. At the World Championships in Doha, Qatar, Zonderland won gold on the high bar at the age of His routine included two double release combinations, a Cassina to Kovacs, followed by a Kolman-Gaylord 2. He became the first man to win three high bar gold medals at the World Championships.[22][23]
Zonderland competed down under at the Melbourne World Cup in Melbourne, Australia, from 21 to 24 February He and Hidetaka Miyachi of Japan scored identical highest combined scores of in the individual horizontal bar apparatus final. However, after activating the tiebreak procedure, Zonderland was relegated to the silver medal because Miyachi's execution score number was higher than his own. Also, between 10 and 14 April , at the European Artistic Gymnastics Championships–an FIG championships held in Szczecin, Poland—Zonderland won his third European gold medal in the individual horizontal bar apparatus final.[24] However, he failed to qualify for the same event final at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Stuttgart after an error in his routine.[25]
At the Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, Zonderland did not qualify for the individual horizontal bar finals after ranking 23rd with a score of due to a fall in the qualification rounds.
Zonderland was named Dutch Sportsman of the year in for his silver medal in high bar at the World Championships. He was selected Sportsman of the Year for a second time in after he won the European Championships, then again for the next two consecutive years after he won the Olympic and the World championships.[26] He was made a Knight of the Order of Orange-Nassau after he won the gold medal at the London Olympics.[27][28]
Zonderland married Linda Steen in September [29] Their son, Bert Eize, was born on 13 October ,[30] and a second son Jan was born on 1 April [31] On 1 November their third child, daughter Sophie, was born.