By Ana Faguy, BBC
Stephen Nedoroscik prepares to compete on the pommel horse on Day Three of the 2024 US Olympic Team Gymnastics Trials at Target Center on 29 June in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Photo: JAMIE SQUIRE / AFP / GETTY
The US gymnastics team has a new breakout star - bespectacled, Rubik's Cube-solving 'pommel horse guy' Stephen Nedoroscik.
The 25-year-old gymnast specialises in the pommel horse, which demands strength, rhythm, and precision.
When he stepped up to the apparatus on Monday night, for the men's artistic gymnastics team final, he delivered a clutch performance, rousing the crowds watching in the arena and at home.
With one 40-second routine, Nedoroscik helped secure the team a bronze medal - its first since 2008 - and became an overnight internet sensation.
Nedoroscik had the final routine in the last rotation of the Olympic final.
His less than one minute on the apparatus was the only thing standing between the US team and a medal.
As he hopped off after scoring 14.866, his fist shot straight into the air and the crowd erupted. He did what he had come to Paris to do.
The internet also took notice of the gymnast from the state of Massachusetts.
Soon, he was being referred to as Mr Pommel Horse. His girlfriend changed her profile on X, formerly Twitter, to "Ms Pommel Horse".
Fans also discovered one of his hobbies: solving Rubik's Cubes. He finished one in less than 10 seconds the day of the competition.
In a interview on Tuesday, Nedoroscik told NBC's The Today Show that solving the puzzle is "stress relief".
"I love to solve it - it's just fun," he said.
Social media users compared him to Clark Kent, Superman's alter-ego who wears glasses.
Nedoroscik, waiting for his routine, sat on the sidelines in glasses, before taking them off to compete.
"Obsessed with this guy on the US men's gymnastics team," one user wrote in a viral post.
"He just sits there until he's activated like a sleeper agent, whips off his glasses like Clark Kent and does a pommel horse routine that helps deliver the team its first medal in 16 years."
NBC's Olympics X account called him "the Clark Kent of pommel horse".
Nedoroscik has strabismus, or crossed eyes, which can cause double vision.
In a 2022 post on TikTok, he showed his followers how his condition allows him to alternate which eye is the dominant eye.
He told The Today Show he thought the memes about him are "awesome" and represent "the people that wear glasses well".
He was asked how he was able to carry out Monday's routine without his glasses, though he has competed in prescription goggles in the past.
"It's not necessarily clear," he said of his vision.
"But the thing about pommel horse is if I keep [the glasses] on, they're going to fly somewhere."
In the end, he said, it's "all about feeling the equipment".
"I don't even really see when I'm doing my gymnastics. It's all in the hands. I can feel everything."
Nedoroscik will compete again in the individual event, the men's pommel horse final, on 3 August.
