Two-time Olympic medalist Jonathan Horton announced his retirement from gymnastics Monday night, according to the Houston Chronicle.
Horton, 31, missed much of the Rio Olympic cycle due to shoulder surgeries and a torn pectoral muscle, the former ultimately derailing his bid to make a third Olympic team.
“I was hurt every single year for six years after never being hurt once,” Horton said at a watch party for his “American Ninja Warrior” appearance Monday, according to the newspaper. “It was a matter of my body telling me that we need to be done.”
Horton, at 5 feet, 1 inch, succeeded 2004 Olympic all-around champion Paul Hamm as the star of U.S. men’s gymnastics.
He led a depleted American team to bronze at the 2008 Beijing Games and tacked on a high bar silver, missing gold by .025.
Horton added a world all-around bronze medal in 2010, plus all-around titles at the 2008 Olympic Trials and 2009 and 2010 U.S. Championships.
“I would love to have won a gold medal, but I’m proud of what I was able to accomplish,” Horton said, according to the newspaper. “I left nothing out there. I gave it all I had, and I don’t live my life by regrets.”
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