The Portuguese trampoline team won the bronze medal today in the women’s team final, their first at the Europeans taking place in Guimarães until Sunday.
Made up of Ingrid Maior, Sofia Correia, Catarina Nunes and Mariana Carvalho, the Portuguese team secured third place with nine points, behind France, who were crowned European champions, with 12, and Georgia, silver, also with 12, and ahead of Ukraine, fourth, with six, and Germany, fifth, also with six.
After Catarina Nunes obtained the lowest score in the first group of five gymnasts to jump and secured one point for the Portuguese team, Sofia Correia executed the second best ‘performance’ in the second group and Ingrid Maior was the second best jumper in the third and final group, each collecting four points.
The Portuguese team improved on their fourth place from 2022 in Rimini, Italy, and repeated the bronze they won at the 2018 edition in Baku, Azerbaijan, with a team then made up of Ana Rente, Beatriz Martins, Mariana Carvalho and Catarina Nunes.
“Since 2018, the last time we won a medal, we were looking to repeat the result. We did all our sets, not perfectly, but we fought until the end and we’re very happy to be back on the podium in a competition like this, especially in Portugal,” Catarina Nunes told Lusa.
After a qualifying round in which she missed out on reaching the semi-finals in the individual section, Sofia Correia was grateful to jump and stressed that it is “always incredible” to win a medal, on a day that even “started badly” as she felt “very nervous”.
France also won the men’s springboard team championship with 13 points, ahead of silver medallists Germany with nine and bronze medallists Spain with nine, in a final that also included Great Britain in fourth and Belgium in fifth, but without Portugal, 11th in this edition’s qualifying round after silver in 2022.
The 29th edition of the Trampoline Europeans runs until Sunday, with Friday reserved for the men’s and women’s double mini-trampoline and tumbling team finals.
In addition to the 325 gymnasts for the senior events, the competition also brings together 291 participants in the junior competitions, with Martim Lopes, Gonçalo Costa, Lucas Gregório and Pedro Mendes winning the bronze medal in the men’s trampoline team final on Wednesday.
