The wheel seems to fall on its side, but the gymnast in the middle of it has the strength, the technique and the elegance to keep the instrument spinning. Balancing on one rim of a double-sided wheel. With his arms on top, his legs at the bottom and his body as the moving center, he keeps the wheel going in the right direction. In the meantime, the gymnast performs elements that earn points for the judgements of those who decide if you perform well. It’s called spiraling. It’s one of the disciplines in a sport that is originally called rhönradturnen, wheel gymnastics.
Swiss Simon Rufener is the 2022 and 2024 world all-round champion. The 27-year-old athlete explains his excitement for the special character of the sport. “I enjoy the feeling of those rolling wheels, the rotations. I’ve had that feeling from the first moment I started with the sport.” That beginning was at age 13, while he eventually was doing some acrobatic gymnastics. But in the village he grew up, Birsfelden, the sport with the rhönrad was actually quite known.
“We had a world champion, Cécile Meschberger in 2007, who comes from our town. There was a bit of publicity about her achievements and a friend took me to practice. I loved it! It was a bit dangerous as well. Combined with some gymnastics elements I already knew from acrobatics, with the wheel as a totally new component, I liked that feeling.” Rufener noticed he was good at it as well. “After a year and a half I got a golden medal at an event! It was in a beginner friendly competition, but hey… I realized I liked competition. I stopped with acrobatics and started training more.”
German sport
Rhönradturnen is a sport of German origin and is internationally also known as wheel gymnastics. Gymnasts use a large wheel (diameter between 2 meters and 2 meters 40, depending on the height of the athlete) to perform exercises. The sport has three disciplines: spiral, straight line and vault. The all-round category combines these disciplines. At the world championships in Almere, the Netherlands, gymnasts from Germany, the United States of America, Japan and Israel, amongst others, showed their skills.
It is not the most well-known sport, but it is recognized because the wheel is also used in various circus acts, for example. As a sport, it is part of gymnastics. Exercises are judged by a jury, but performance and dance also is a part of the sport, especially at the discipline straight line. The wheel rolls up and down in a straight line and the gymnast performs elements in an exercise with self-chosen music and devised choreography.
“I really like the beginning of a new routine in straight line”, Rufener says, “Creating new elements, learning new difficult elements and showing myself to the public in competition, but in training spiral is more fun and challenging. The wheel is rolling constantly, sometimes on one rim, and you constantly do your moves and think ahead at the same time. The angle and the speed are important, so you have to keep focus on so many things.”
Proud
In Switzerland up to 200 gymnasts are competing in wheel gymnastics, which is really a large number considering the small country and the athletes worldwide. Rufener lives in Zurich, studies for secondary school teacher at the University of Lucerne and is involved in three gymnastics clubs, not just as an athlete, but also as judge and trainer. The sport has an important role in his life. “But when I’m telling people I do wheel gymnastics, I never mention I’m a world champion at the highest level of the sport. I don’t know, I wouldn’t define myself over it. It’s something I achieved and that I’m very proud of, but I tell people I’m doing it for fun.”
Which is probably the best reason to do wheel gymnastics or any other sport. After his title in 2022, Rufener struggled to motivate himself. “That’s why I’ve mainly focused on having fun in the sport this past year, because I’ve already achieved the biggest goal in my sport two years ago. It’s tough to defend a world title, but I succeeded. I loved showing the best of myself to all my friends and fans who came with me from Switzerland.” And in two years, at the next World Championships? “I want to spend more time outside the gym the next couple of years, but I think I will still be there. If not as a gymnast then as a fan!”
