Mo Huilan’s beautiful smile and difficult gymnastics endeared fans during the mid-‘90s.  However, as brilliantly as she performed in the team and event finals portions of competition, her missteps in the all-around cost her many worldly titles.

Mo entered the world with a twin sister on July 11, 1979 in Guiling, the capital of the Guangxi Province in China.  Mo and her sister Huifang began gymnastics in 1985.  In 1990, they were invited to attend a camp in Beijing to test who would be admitted to the Chinese National Training Center.  Huifang was invited, but Mo was not.  Mo begged the coaches to let her go to the national training center, and they relented.  Eventually, an injury forced Huifang to retire. 

Mo’s performance at the 1994 World Championships in Brisbane, Australia caught the attention of the international gymnastics community.  She placed seventh all-around, the highest of any Chinese gymnast.  She also debuted a Gaylord Flip on uneven bars, which is now known as a Mo Salto.

By the 1995 World Championships in Sabae, Japan, Mo had upgraded her difficulty, including a beautiful double-twisting Yurchenko.  She led the field after preliminaries, but a fall on a double tuck dismount off beam cost her the all-around title.  She qualified to all four event finals, winning the gold on beam and silver on bars.

Mo was a clear favorite to win the 1996 Olympics, but a back injury hampered Mo’s training.  She committed uncharacteristic errors in preliminaries, finishing 13th all-around, but still qualified to vault and floor finals.  Mo had a chance to redeem herself with the “new life” rule in the all-around final, but stepped out of bounds on floor, her last event.  The mistake left her in fourth place, just 0.206 out of first.  Mo did win an individual medal on vault, however, where she placed second behind Romania’s Simona Amanar. 

Mo competed through the 1997 World Championships in Lausanne, Switzerland, where she helped her team win a bronze medal.  After retiring from gymnastics, Mo attended college and studied broadcasting.  She worked for television networks during the 1999 World Championships in Tianjin, and the 2000 and 2004 Olympics.

Though Mo Huilan never achieved gymnastics’ greatest prize, she won the hearts of gymnastics fans across the world with her artistry and outgoing personality.

Bio by: Splitleap