Max Whitlock would be a very good poker player, apparently nerveless but inside his stomach churning perfect somersaults.
The six-time Olympic medallist admitted he'd rarely felt so anxious as he helped team-mates Joe Fraser, Jake Jarman, Harry Hepworth and Luke Whitehouse all but secure their place in Monday's team artistic gymnastics final.
Whitlock is calling time on his career here in Paris and knew one slip could have brought the curtain down prematurely at the Bercy Arena.
However, he had nothing to worry about. Jarman, Hepworth and Whitehouse, newcomers at this level, looked totally at home under the glare of the big light.
Former world champion Fraser was as reliable as ever and Whitlock rode his trademark pommel horse in style.
Whitlock's first Olympic medal was a bronze in the team event at London 2012, which has been followed with two fourth places in Rio and Tokyo.
Max Whitlock.
— Team GB (@TeamGB) March 17, 2024
What a routine for @Paris2024.
What an athlete!!pic.twitter.com/vW1l6K0jo4
"It's my last Olympic Games and I knew I had one shot, if it didn't go right on this first day, when the nerves were at the highest and the pressure was through the roof, it could have all stopped today. That was really hard to deal with," said Whitlock.
"There is just a lot of relief right now, qualifications are always so tough, especially at the Olympics, and everybody was really feeling it, we knew what was a stake.”
Whitlock will hope to have done enough to secure his place in next week's pommel horse final, as he seeks to win the title for the third consecutive Games, though that won't be confirmed until late on Saturday, when the qualifying competition concludes.
Whitehouse, a back-to-back European champion on the floor, looked impressive on his signature apparatus while Hepworth shone on both vault and rings and Fraser underlined his credentials on the parallel and horizontal bars.
Jarman made his breakthrough at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, winning four golds, and was scouted by a coach from famous club Huntingdon while swinging from the monkey bars in his local park.
Solid across all six apparatus, he was Team GB's highest ranked gymnast in the provisional standings for the men's blue-riband all-around competition.
"We’ve got around three generations of gymnasts out here – there is so much depth in this team," said Jarman, who is looking to complete his set of vault gold medals as the reigning world, European and Commonwealth champion.
"A lot of people see us as a team of individual specialists but when we come together, I feel like we can show that we can do well as a collective."
Sportsbeat 2024