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The multiple Olympic champion in gymnastics Nadia Comaneci posted, on Friday, a video message on her personal Facebook account in which she thanked all those who sent her well wishes on the occasion of her turning 60, agerpres reports.
Several Romanian champions and personalities of public life sent, on Tuesday, through the Facebook page of the Romanian Sports and Olympic Committee (COSR), congratulatory messages to former great gymnast Nadia Comaneci, on her 60th birthday. Among the well-wishers were the chairman of the COSR, Mihai Covaliu, handballer Cristina Neagu, former tennis player Ilie Nastase, gymnast Marian Dragulescu, former gymnast Catalina Ponor and artists Cristi Minculescu, Stefan Banica Jr., Dan Bittman and Nicola.
Nadia Comanesci, the first gymnast in the world to receive a perfect 10 score in an international competition, is turning, on Friday, 60.
President Klaus Iohannis signed, on Friday, the decree to decorate gymnast Nadia Comaneci with the National Order of the Star of Romania in the rank of Grand Officer, the Presidential Administration announced.
At 14 years old, Nadia Comaneci became the best known gymnast in history after amazing the world of sports, on July 18, 1976, by obtaining the first 10 score in an edition of the Olympic Games, given that the scoreboard was not ready for such a performance indicating 1. The Romanian athlete obtained, in the Olympic Games of Montreal 1976, the perfect score another six times for a total of seven, winning three gold medals (in all-around, balance beam and uneven bars), one silver medal (team) and one bronze (floor).
Born on November 12, 1961, in Onesti, Nadia Comaneci won in her career 9 medals in the Olympic games (5 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze), 4 in the World Championships (2 gold and 2 silver), 12 in the European Championships (9 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze) and 5 in the Universiade (5 gold). In November 1989, just one month before the fall of communism in Romania, she illegally crossed the border and settled in the United States of America. There she married US gymnast Bart Conner, in his turn a multiple Olympic and world champion in artistic gymnastics, and together they have one son, Dylan Paul Conner.
She owns, together with Bart Conner, a gymnastics academy in Oklahoma City and a few sporting goods stores, and in the past years she was involved in several charitable events through the Nadia Comaneci Foundation. The former gymnast received the Olympic Order from the IOC twice and was included by the International Gymnastics Federation in the Hall of Fame. She is, also, a global ambassador for the Special Olympics and is among the members of the Laureus World Sports Academy.
