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Oleg Yuriyovych Verniaiev (; born 29 September 1993) is a Ukrainian artistic gymnast. He is the 2016 Olympic parallel bars champion and individual all-around silver medalist. Verniaiev is also the 2014 World parallel bars champion, the 2015 European individual all-around champion and the 2017 European individual all-around champion.
He is a three-time Olympian, having represented Ukraine at the 2012, 2016, and 2024 Olympic Games. He missed the 2020 Olympic Games due to a doping ban resulting from having tested positive for the banned substance meldonium in an out-of-competition test in August 2020.
Verniaiev won the 2015 American Cup in Arlington, Texas with a score of 90.597, 0.499 over silver medalist and 2013 World Championships all-around silver medalist Ryōhei Katō of Japan. Verniaiev also became the FIG World Cup series champion. At the 2015 European Championships Verniaiev won the individual all-around with a score of 89.582, beating 2013 champion David Belyavskiy. He also qualified to the parallel bars final where he won the gold medal with a score of 15.866. At the 2015 European Games, Verniaiev was part of the Ukrainian team, winning silver in the team final behind Russia. Verniaiev qualified into the all-around, floor exercise, pommel horse, vault, parallel bars, and high bar finals. He won the all-around final with a score of 90.332, and the vault final with a score of 15.266. He placed sixth on floor exercise with 14.233, and fifth on pommel horse (13.833), parallel bars (14.633), and high bar (14.900).
At the 2016 European Championships Verniaiev won a gold medal on vault and a silver medal on parallel bars. In August 2016, at the 2016 Olympic Games, he won the silver medal in the men's all-around competition with a score of 92.266, only 0.099 behind Kōhei Uchimura's 92.365. Verniaiev's Olympic all-around medal was Ukraine's first since Alexander Beresch won bronze at the 2000 Olympic Games.
Verniaiev also gained prominence for his public apology over the Ukrainian squad's strategy during the team final, when due to injuries they did not put up gymnasts on all events, effectively ruling the team out of contention.
He won the gold medal on the parallel bars, scoring 16.041, giving Ukraine its first gymnastics gold at the Games since 2004. He also finished fifth on vault and eighth on pommel horse and horizontal bar.
Personal life
Verniaiev was born in Donetsk. He was educated at the Donetsk State Institute of Health, Physical Education and Sport. Verniaiev resides inKyiv
Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...
. He is coached by Gennady Sartynsky.
Gymnastics career
2011–2012
During the 2011 Summer Universiade Verniaiev competed in the men's vault final, finishing in seventh with a score of 15.262. He was also part of the Ukrainian team that finished fifth in the men's team final. At the 2011 World Championships he competed in the team all-around event with Nikolai Kuksenkov, Vitaliy Nakonechnyi, Oleg Stepko, Igor Radivilov, and Roman Zozulya, finishing in fifth. He scored 14.461 on floor, 13.866 on pommel horse, 14.833 on vault, and 13.800 on parallel bars. Verniaiev finished sixth in the 2012 American Cup with a score of 88.132. At the 2012 European Championships he participated in the team all-around final for the Ukrainian team that finished in fifth. He also made the parallel bars final, finishing in second place with a score of 15.66, 0.1 points behind the winner Marcel Nguyen of Germany. He was victorious in the all-around final of the 2012 Ukrainian Championships, scoring 90.300 points and winning by a margin of 2.65 points over second place Oleg Stepko. Verniaiev competed at the 2012 Olympic Games in the men's team event alongside Nikolai Kuksenkov, Vitalii Nakonechnyi, Oleg Stepko and Igor Radivilov. In the team final Ukraine finished in fourth with a score of 271.526, missing out on a medal by less than 0.2 points. Ukraine was initially awarded third place for a bronze medal; however following an appeal from Japan over a pommel horse score, the Japanese team was awarded an extra 0.7 points, allowing them to move from fourth place to second, knocking Ukraine out of the medals in the process. Verniaiev finished eleventh in the individual all-around final with a score of 88.931.2013–2016
Verniaiev won the Ukrainian National Championships in 2013. He took the silver medal in the individual all-around finals at the 2013 American Cup. He won the bronze medal in the individual all-around at the 2013 European Championships inMoscow
Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...
, Russia.
At the 2013 Summer Universiade, Verniaiev led his Ukrainian team ( Igor Radivilov, Oleg Stepko, Petro Pakhnyuk
Petro Pakhnyuk (, also spelled Pakhniuk, born 26 November 1991 in Kyiv) is a Ukrainian (until 2014 and after 2017) and Azerbaijani (2014-2017) male artistic gymnast and member of the national team.
Career
He participated at the 2014 World Arti ...
, and Maksym Semiankiv
Maksym Oleksandrovych Semiankiv (; born January 20, 1992) is a Ukrainian male artistic gymnast and part of the national team. He participated at the 2015 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Glasgow, and qualified for the 2016 Summer Oly ...
) to a second-place finish in the team final, and qualified for the all-around final. He won the all-around bronze medal (tied with Russian gymnast David Belyavskiy). He won another bronze medal in the parallel bars final.
In May 2014, at the 2014 European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria, Verniaiev contributed scores of 15.100 (floor), 14.400 (pommel horse), 14.900 (rings), 14.783 (vault), 15.591 (parallel bars), and 14.600 (horizontal bar), helping Ukraine win the team bronze medal with a total score of 262.087 points behind Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...
. In event finals, Verniaiev won the gold medal on the parallel bars (15.966) and won the bronze medal on vault (14.916).
He won gold on the parallel bars at the 2014 World Championships in Nanning, China. After the wrong anthem (the anthem of Uzbekistan) was played during the medal ceremony, he said "It was written in my face that I didn't like it. They came up and apologised for the anthem and promised to change it for TV broadcast. But I thought it would be incorrect, because I screwed up my face and it will be even worse if the anthem is replaced."
Verniaiev won the 2015 American Cup in Arlington, Texas with a score of 90.597, 0.499 over silver medalist and 2013 World Championships all-around silver medalist Ryōhei Katō of Japan. Verniaiev also became the FIG World Cup series champion. At the 2015 European Championships Verniaiev won the individual all-around with a score of 89.582, beating 2013 champion David Belyavskiy. He also qualified to the parallel bars final where he won the gold medal with a score of 15.866. At the 2015 European Games, Verniaiev was part of the Ukrainian team, winning silver in the team final behind Russia. Verniaiev qualified into the all-around, floor exercise, pommel horse, vault, parallel bars, and high bar finals. He won the all-around final with a score of 90.332, and the vault final with a score of 15.266. He placed sixth on floor exercise with 14.233, and fifth on pommel horse (13.833), parallel bars (14.633), and high bar (14.900).
At the 2016 European Championships Verniaiev won a gold medal on vault and a silver medal on parallel bars. In August 2016, at the 2016 Olympic Games, he won the silver medal in the men's all-around competition with a score of 92.266, only 0.099 behind Kōhei Uchimura's 92.365. Verniaiev's Olympic all-around medal was Ukraine's first since Alexander Beresch won bronze at the 2000 Olympic Games.
Verniaiev also gained prominence for his public apology over the Ukrainian squad's strategy during the team final, when due to injuries they did not put up gymnasts on all events, effectively ruling the team out of contention.
He won the gold medal on the parallel bars, scoring 16.041, giving Ukraine its first gymnastics gold at the Games since 2004. He also finished fifth on vault and eighth on pommel horse and horizontal bar.
2017–2020
At the 2017 European Championships Verniaiev won gold medals in the individual all-around and on the parallel bars, and a bronze medal on vault. At the 2017 Summer Universiade, Verniaiev won the gold medal in the individual all-around competition, and won silver with the team and on vault and pommel horse, and won the bronze medal on rings. At the 2017 World Championships Verniaiev won silver on parallel bars behind Zou Jingyuan. At the 2018 World Championships Verniaiev once again won silver on parallel bars behind Zou. In 2019 Verniaiev competed at the European Championships where he placed seventh on pommel horse and eighth on parallel bars. He next competed at the 2019 European Games where he won gold on parallel bars, silver in the all-around and on pommel horse, both behind David Belyavskiy. At the 2019 World Championships Verniaiev won bronze in the all-around behind Nikita Nagornyy and Artur Dalaloyan. Verniaiev began 2020 competing at the American Cup, where he won silver behind Sam Mikulak. The remainder of competitions in 2020 were either canceled or postponed due to the globalCOVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
.
Doping and ban
In December 2020 Verniaiev was notified by the International Gymnastics Federation that he was provisionally suspended from competition, backdated to November 2020. The reason for the suspension was a positive test for meldonium, which was banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency starting in January 2016. Following arbitration, the provisional suspension was upheld and Verniaiev was banned from competition for four years. During this suspension timeframe Verniaiev would miss both the 2020 Olympic Games (rescheduled to 2021) and the 2024 Olympic Games. In July 2021 Verniaiev expressed his intention to appeal the suspension to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, contending that meldonium was not found in subsequent tests. He acknowledged the presence of the drug in his body, but said he does not know how it got there. On March 14, 2023, Verniaiev announced that his appeal was successful and the CAS reduced his ban to two years, resulting in his ability to return to competition immediately.Post-ban gymnastics career
2023–2024
Verniaiev made his return to competition in September 2023 at the Mersin Challenge Cup where he won gold on parallel bars and silver on pommel horse behind Ahmad Abu Al-Soud. He competed at the 2023 World Championships where he helped Ukraine finish twelfth during qualifications. Although they didn't qualify to the team final, they qualified a full team to the 2024 Olympic Games. Verniaiev competed at the 2024 European Championships alongside Nazar Chepurnyi, Illia Kovtun, Igor Radivilov, and Radomyr Stelmakh; together they qualified to the team final in first place and individually Verniaiev won silver in the all-around behind Marios Georgiou. During the team final Verniaiev contributed scores on all six apparatuses towards Ukraine's first place finish. Verniaiev competed at the 2024 Olympic Games alongside Chepurnyi, Kovtun, Radivilov, and Stelmakh. During the qualification round he helped Ukraine qualify to the team final and individually he qualified to the all-around, pommel horse, and parallel bars finals. During the team final Verniaiev contributed scores on all six apparatuses towards Ukraine's fifth place finish. He finished eighth in the all-around, fifth on pommel horse, and eighth on parallel bars.Competitive history
Olympic results
2012 London Olympics
2016 Rio Olympics
References
External links
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Verniaiev, Oleg 1993 births Living people Sportspeople from Donetsk Gymnasts from Donetsk Oblast Ukrainian male artistic gymnasts Armed Forces (sports society) sportspeople in Ukraine Olympic gymnasts for Ukraine Olympic gold medalists for Ukraine Olympic silver medalists for Ukraine Olympic medalists in gymnastics Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics Gymnasts at the 2012 Summer Olympics Gymnasts at the 2016 Summer Olympics Gymnasts at the 2015 European Games Medalists at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships European Games medalists in gymnastics European Games gold medalists for Ukraine European Games silver medalists for Ukraine Summer World University Games medalists in gymnastics FISU World University Games gold medalists for Ukraine FISU World University Games silver medalists for Ukraine FISU World University Games bronze medalists for Ukraine Medalists at the 2013 Summer Universiade Medalists at the 2015 Summer Universiade Medalists at the 2017 Summer Universiade European champions in gymnastics Ukrainian sportspeople in doping cases Doping cases in gymnastics Recipients of the Order of Danylo Halytsky 21st-century Ukrainian sportsmen Gymnasts at the 2024 Summer Olympics