Su Weide, the horizontal bar bronze medalist at last year's world championships, will fill in for Sun Wei in Team China and compete in the Olympic men's gymnastics qualifications on Saturday, the Chinese team confirmed on Friday.

The 24-year-old Su has been training as an alternate in France since July 17. He arrived in Paris on Thursday to join the five-man team for China after taking a 1.5-hour train ride from the training camp.

"Su is in good form. He is competitive on the horizontal bar and floor, which is similar to Sun Wei's strength," said deputy team leader Lu Bin.

Sun sustained an ankle injury during podium training two days ago. In his second vault attempt early in rotation two, he landed awkwardly on the mat and hurt his ankle. He left the training session early before returning briefly to join his teammates on the pommel horse.

In spite of Sun's injury, the Chinese men remained upbeat.

"We have a very strong team," said 2021 world all-around champion Zhang Boheng after the training session. "We will go for the team gold medal. And I'll give my all to an individual all-around title."

His teammate Xiao Ruoteng, the Tokyo all-around silver medalist, considered being able to come to Paris a success. "Right now we put the team first. We'll see what happens next," he said.

Next to the China's team in the pre-competition training were the Japanese men. Oka Shinnosuke, the national champion, went through several dynamic routines without major mistakes, while world all-around champion Daiki Hashimoto's finger looked fine and unlikely to be an issue.

"My finger has improved significantly since July, and I can move it well now. Initially, the swelling made gripping difficult in the mornings. However, as it heals, my routines have improved, especially on the horizontal bar," said Hashimoto on his injury.

Chinese female gymnasts, four out of five of whom are newcomers to the Olympics, tried the apparatus for the first time on Thursday in the Bercy Arena. Next to them, American gymnast Simone Biles and her teammates looked energetic as ever, doing their routines in front of dozens of cameras.

Biles gave her coach a high-five after completing a Yurchenko double pike with a small hop on vault, and again another after the uneven bars.

"For me she looked good. You tell me what you thought, but the whole team looked great," said coach Cecile Landi.

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