level discipline birth_date article_title name retired
elite women 's artistic gymnastics 1977 qiao ya
 qiao ya 乔娅 1996
qiao ya

qiao ya -lrb- ; born january 10 , 1977 -rrb- is a retired chinese artistic gymnast .
she was the 1994 asian games all-around champion , a finalist on balance beam at the 1994 and 1995 world gymnastics championships , and competed at the 1996 olympic games in atlanta - where she placed 11th in the individual all-around and 4th with the team during team finals .
despite a disappointing showing at the 1994 american cup , qiao began her international career on a high : beating her more widely known teammate , mo huilan , to the individual all-around title at the 1994 asian games .
at these championships qiao also placed first with her team and finished with a bronze medal on balance beam .
at the 1994 world championships qiao had moderate success - finishing 10th in the individual all-around and making the balance beam final .
she qualified for the beam final in 4th place and was one of the favourites to challenge america 's shannon miller for the title but took a fall during the final on her tumbling run -lrb- a back-handspring to two layout somersaults -rrb- , and ultimately finished in 7th place .
in 1995 qiao competed at the 1995 world championships - where the team took second place behind 1994 world champions romania .
the chinese team actually scored the highest in the team optionals portion of the competition but their disappointing scores during the compulsories round -lrb- where they were weak on vault and bars -rrb- prevented them from taking first place .
during the team competition she did not compete on all four events and so did not qualify for the individual all-around final .
she did however qualify for the beam final -lrb- for the 2nd consecutive year -rrb- but a balance break at the beginning of the routine -lrb- a difficult round off to layout step-out mount onto the beam -rrb- resulted in an 8th place finish .
qiao also competed at the 1996 summer olympics .
after their impressive showing at the 1995 worlds many gymnastics fans and experts expected the chinese to challenge the united states , romania and russia for the team title .
however the team did not compete well during both the compulsories and team optional exercises and finished the competition in 4th place , just ahead of ukraine but a long way behind america -lrb- 1st -rrb- , russia -lrb- 2nd -rrb- and romania -lrb- 3rd -rrb- .
qiao qualified for the all-around final in 29th place and ultimately finished 11th in that competition .
having scored a 9.725 on beam , a 9.675 on floor and 9.718 on vault she looked set to finish in the top 8 but a disappointing set on bars -lrb- traditionally her weakest piece -rrb- where she scored only a 9.600 dropped her out of the top 10 altogether .
qiao retired from competitive gymnastics shortly after the 1996 olympics and is now coaching in singapore .
