PARIS -- He wears glasses, except when he's competing. He solves a Rubik's Cube hundreds of times a day in the athlete's village, aiming for under 10 seconds each time. His job is horse.
And he has become one of the breakout stars of these Olympics. The U.S. men's gymnastics team brought 25-year-old former Penn State gymnast Stephen Nedoroscik to Paris with one assignment: hit pommel horse routines. He's the 2021 world champion in the event and competes one of the most difficult routines in the world on what is traditionally a low-scoring apparatus for Team USA.
Stephen Nedoroscik finishes his pommel horse routine in the final and the crowd goes WILD! 👏 #ParisOlympics
— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) August 3, 2024
📺 E! and Peacock pic.twitter.com/JbCPmqNJA7
And he has delivered. In Saturday's event final, Nedoroscik earned bronze, the only individual medal the U.S. men will take home from Paris. Ireland's Rhys McClenaghan won gold with a score of 15.533 and Nariman Kurbanov of Kazakhstan earned silver with a 15.433.
Nedoroscik competed a routine with the same difficulty score as he did during qualification -- a 6.4 -- but improved his execution score and earned a 15.3. He had barely dismounted the horse when his teammate, Brody Malone, who was on the floor with him during the competition, started jumping up and down before engulfing him in a bear hug.
"I do my best to take the pressure and turn it into excitement," Nedoroscik said after Monday's team final. "I want to be the guy on pommel horse when it comes down to the wire, because I know it's going to come down to the wire and I want it to be me."
Nedoroscik anchored the U.S. pommel horse lineup during the team final, was the last competitor of the meet and captivated fans with a routine that secured bronze for Team USA, the first Olympic medal for the U.S. men's team in 16 years.
Because Nedoroscik had little responsibility during the first five rotations of the meet, television cameras caught him cheering on his teammates and sitting quietly, visualizing his routine "hundreds of times" with his eyes closed.
Stephen Nedoroscik, the Clark Kent of pommel horse! 🫡🇺🇸 #ParisOlympics pic.twitter.com/1HfYFSbJvH
— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) July 30, 2024
Then he removed his warmup and glasses and hit one of the best routines of the night. Almost instantly, "the Clark Kent of pommel horse" became an internet sensation. Memes of Nedoroscik swinging on an actual horse, as well as photos of a bespectacled Nedoroscik alongside images of Christopher Reeves' Clark Kent flooded social media. On Saturday, an American eyewear brand gave away free frames it dubbed "The Stephen" at 11:15 a.m. ET, the precise time the pommel horse final was scheduled to begin in Paris.
"It's been unbelievable the amount of people reaching out and following me and making memes of me -- and to think that happened right after a historic event for my team getting the bronze medal," Nedoroscik said after Saturday's meet. "I've been consistently on top of this world for the past week now."
He said he had to turn off his phone notifications to "lock in for this competition today," but hoped that when he turned them back on he'd see more support.
On Saturday, wearing his trademark specs once again, Nedoroscik walked to the floor at Bercy Arena for the medal ceremony. On his way there, he tugged on his right ear, a message to his friends and family at home to let them know he's thinking about them. Then he bowed his head to receive his bronze medal and when he stood, he pushed his glasses back into place.
"It's really nice for me to be able to come out today and bring home some hardware for Team USA," he said. "This has been my goal for so many years. I'm just honored and excited."