COMPARATIVE STUDY ON THE AGE OF PEAK PERFORMANCE ACROSS WORLD GYMNASTICS DISCIPLINES IN WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS AND THE OLYMPIC GAMES (2012–2025) : AN UP-DATE

The Olympic Games and World Championships constitute the pinnacle of an athlete’s career, including gymnasts, serving as key benchmarks for performance evaluation and long-term career development. (1) Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the historical analysis of the chronological age trend of all participants of men’s (MAG) and women’s (WAG) artistic gymnastics, rhythmic (RG), trampoline (TRA), aerobic (AER), acrobatic (ACRO) gymnastics, and parkour (PK) in the period between 2012 and 2025. The total number of participants in this study was (n = 14487).; (2) Methods: We used an independent t-test to analyze the differences between the Olympic Games and the World Championships.; (3) Results: During the analyzed Olympic Games period (2012–2024), the average age of MAG and WAG gymnasts increased by 0.98 and 1.49 years, respectively. In RG, the increase was 0.39 years. In TRA competitions, athletes tended to be younger, with an overall age decrease of 2.26 years for men and 0.70 years for women. Female (AER) gymnasts are 1.17 years younger in 2024 than in 2012, while other non-Olympic disciplines show no significant changes.; (4) Conclusions: Overall, the study highlights how age patterns differ across gymnastics disciplines and genders, providing insights to optimize coaching, preformance, talent identification, injury prevention and long-term training programs strategies for elite athletes. As routines grow more complex, with higher difficulty and deductions in the Code of Points (COP), gymnasts need greater experience, while each Olympic cycle demands more time for athletes and coaches to build stability, mastery, and safety.