Dipa Karmakar pulls off Produnova to enter vault finals

The girl from Tripura has captured popular imagination with her extremely difficult and dangerous Produnova vault. In the qualification round yesterday, Dipa performed the Produnova in her first attempt. Although her landing was a bit off as she bent low, she was awarded 7.000 on difficulty and 8.1 on execution in her first attempt at the Produnova taking her to 15.1.

In her second attempt, Dipa pulled off a ‘Tsuk double full twist’ with a step to the side. She received a score of 6.0 for difficulty in the second attempt and an 8.6 for the execution.

Three-time international all-round champion Simone Biles was the leader of the table at the end with a score of 16.050. The American scored a sensational 9.700 on execution in both her attempts as she led the way.

After a 14.850 in vault, 11.666 in uneven bars, and 12.866 in balance beam, Dipa Karmakar scored 12.033 in floor exercise with 5.2 in difficulty and 7.133 in execution. However, she received -0.3 as penalty. Although Dipa was 47th in the standings overall, she was sixth in the vault rankings after her attempt.

However, the Indian had to get through anxious moments as two-third of the sub-divisions were yet to complete the vault. She slid to 8th in the early hours of today but when all was done and dusted had managed to squeeze through to the vault finals. India's first Olympic gymnast had created further history by entering the final.