On May 5, Frederick Richard guaranteed that he would win a gold medal at the World Gymnastics Championships in five months’ time.
Richard delivered in his final routine of worlds on Saturday, claiming his first title on floor exercise in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
“I hope this is a lesson to everybody that you don’t have to wait to get the win to say you will be a champion,” Richard said, adding that he’s going to sleep with his gold medal. “You don’t have to know when it’s going to happen or how it’s going to happen, but believing it every second of every day does pay off. I’m proof of that now.”
It was a four-medal day for the U.S. — Claire Pease added vault silver, while Skye Blakely earned vault and uneven bars bronze, adding to her all-around gold and team silver. Blakely is the fifth U.S. gymnast to win at least four medals at a single worlds.
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Richard, a 22-year-old University of Michigan graduate, tallied 14.633 points, edging Brit Jake Jarman, the 2025 World champion, by 33 thousandths of a point. He won over a field that included the last two Olympic gold medalists.
Richard added his first global title to his bronze medals from the all-around and team events at the 2023 Worlds and from the team event at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
He’s the first American man to win a world title on floor since 2003, when Paul Hamm shared gold.
He’s also the first American man to win a global championship medal in team, all-around and individual apparatus finals since Danell Leyva, who bagged eight career medals between the Olympics and worlds from 2011 through 2016.
In women’s vault, Pease and Blakely took silver and bronze behind Brazilian Rebeca Andrade, who claimed her third world title in the event.
An hour later, Blakely added bronze on bars behind Algerian Kaylia Nemour, the 2024 Olympic gold medalist who earned her third consecutive world title in the event.
Pease, 17, earned her first individual medal in her first World Championships.
Blakely, 21, became the fifth American to earn at least four medals at a single worlds after Kurt Thomas (1979), Nastia Liukin (2005), Rebecca Bross (2010) and Simone Biles (2013, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2019, 2023).
The World Championships conclude Sunday with the last set of apparatus finals — women’s beam (with Blakely) and floor and men’s vault, parallel bars and high bar — live on Peacock at 9 a.m. ET.
