Igor Cassina
Encyclopedia
Igor Cassina is a province in the Lombardy region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Milan. The provincial territory is highly urbanized, resulting in the third highest population density among the Italian provinces with more than 2,000 inhabitants/km2, just behind the provinces of...

) is an Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 gymnast who won gold in the men's horizontal bar at the 2004 Summer Olympics
2004 Summer Olympics
The 2004 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad, was a premier international multi-sport event held in Athens, Greece from August 13 to August 29, 2004 with the motto Welcome Home. 10,625 athletes competed, some 600 more than expected, accompanied by 5,501 team...

 in Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

. This competition saw a crowd protest over a low score for a routine by Alexei Nemov
Alexei Nemov
Alexei Yurievich Nemov is a gymnast from Russia and one of the most medaled gymnasts, male or female, of all time. He has won 12 Olympic medals, including more Olympic bronze medals than any other athlete. Nemov's sense of showmanship and his difficult routines have won him many fans...

 of Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, which lasted for fifteen minutes until the score was raised. Despite this atmosphere, Cassina performed his exercise without major error, and he took the gold medal over Paul Hamm
Paul Hamm
Paul Elbert Hamm is an American artistic gymnast. He is a World Champion gymnast and three-time Olympic medalist. He won the all-around competition at the 2004 Olympic Games.-Career:...

 of the U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, even though they tied. This gold was also the 500th Italian medal at the Summer Olympics. At the 2008 Summer Olympics
2008 Summer Olympics
The 2008 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, was a major international multi-sport event that took place in Beijing, China, from August 8 to August 24, 2008. A total of 11,028 athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees competed in 28 sports and 302 events...

 he was 4th in the man's horzontal bar.

At the World Gymnastics Championships he won in Anaheim 2003 the silver medal and in London 2009 the bronze medal.

At the European Gymnastics Championships he won in Patras 2002 and Debrecen 2005 the silver medal and in Amsterdam 2007 the bronze medal, always in the man's horzontal bar.

Igor Cassina had already entered the history of gymnastics
Gymnastics
Gymnastics is a sport involving performance of exercises requiring physical strength, flexibility, agility, coordination, and balance. Internationally, all of the gymnastic sports are governed by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique with each country having its own national governing body...

 before winning the Olympic gold. He was the first ever to perform a giant Kovacs straight with 1/1 turn (also known as a Kõlman in the straight position), which the International Gymnastics Federation decided to name Cassina after him as from 2002.

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