Shawn Johnson on the beam.[xinhua]

The Artistic Gymnastics competition finally drew to a close on August 19, with the United States' pocket prodigy Shawn Johnson finally winning an Olympic gold medal and China finishing on top with a total of nine gold medals in the competition.

Johnson came to the Beijing Olympics with a huge reputation. The 16-year-old gold medalist had won three gold medals at the 2007 World Championships, which was only her first year of being a senior gymnast. With this kind of reputation, few would have not forgiven Johnson for expecting a swag of gold medals from Beijing 2008. However, Johnson faced tough competition from her teammate Nastia Liukin in the All-Around Event and was surprised by Romanian Sandra Izbasa's brilliant performance in the Floor Exercise.

Johnson's performance tonight in the Beam was risky and skilful. She was the deserving winner of the gold medal. Her perfection and obsession with minutia resemble the best Chinese gymnasts. Despite the domination of the Chinese gymnastics team at Beijing 2008, the real highlight of the Games has been the dynamics of the female gymnasts from the United States. Johnson and Liukin have given the United States an amazing combination of China and Russia within the same team.

Even though Liukin was probably the most outstanding female gymnast at the Games, expect Johnson to be an unstoppable force in the upcoming years, which will culminate in a lot of gold medals at London 2012. Johnson has a natural sassiness that will cushion her from the cruel blows that are typical of her sport.

Tonight Johnson received her reward for years of hard training and effort. The unluckiest gymnast at Beijing 2008 was probably China's Cheng Fei, who won one gold and two bronze medals. Her Team gold medal is a nice consolation prize, but Cheng desperately needed to add an individual gold medal to her resume. Unfortunate mistakes robbed her of gold medals in the Vault, Floor Exercise and Beam events, and it is doubtful whether the body of the 20-year-old gymnast can hold out till London 2012.

Li Xiaopeng and Zou Kai secured China's eighth and ninth gold medals in the Artistic Gymnastics competition. Li easily won the Men's Parallel Bars, while Zou won the Men's Horizontal Bar. Zou has had a dream Olympic debut, playing an instrumental part in China's gold-medal-winning performance in the Men's Team event and winning two individual gold medals. In fact, Zou has become only the second Chinese gymnast to win three gold medals at a single Olympic Games – the first was the legendary Li Ning at Los Angeles 1984.

Li finished tonight with the fourth gold medal of his career, which makes him one of the most decorated Chinese gymnasts in history. The 27-year-old gymnast has not decided on whether he will continue his distinguished career.

"I'm not really sure whether I will continue training or not. I think it is still too early for me to make a decision," Li said.

(Beijing2008.cn August 20, 2008)