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Gymnastics in Nigeria
Team Nigeria Gymnastics
Gymnastic is a modern sport in Nigeria that involves the art of performing various types of exercise either on bars, beam, floor, and vaulting horse. The origin of this sport dates back to the ancient Greeks exercises associated with mounting and dismounting a horse with started in Sparta and Athens.
In Nigeria, there are different forms of competitive gymnastic events which are always managed by the national governing body called the Nigerian Federation of Gymnastics, affiliated by Federation of International Gymnastics which is the global governing body for competitive gymnastics in Switzerland.
Competitive Artistic gymnastics is the best known gymnastic event in the country where athletes perform short routines on different apparatus with a minimum time for vaulting.
These events require a vault, uneven bars, balance beam and floor exercise for women., and similarly, pommel horse, floor exercise, vault, parallel bars, still rings and a horizontal bar for men.
Conversely, the sport of gymnastics is not popular in Nigeria compared to other sports, specifically the modern Olympics. The country so far has not made any record in competitive modern Olympic gymnastics due to poor facilities, lack of sponsors and absence of national competitions.
