competitions, she was invited to train at the Romanian junior team facility in Onești. Two years later, she was promoted to the national training center in Deva. Răducan's first major international event was the 1998 Junior European Championships, where she won a silver medal on the balance beam, tied for bronze on the floor exercise and took fourth place in the all-around. The next year, she rose to the senior ranks and made an impact at the World Championships in Tianjin, China, winning the floor exercise final and placing fifth in the all-around. While Răducan's work on the uneven bars was considered weak, her skills on beam, vault and floor exercise were applauded. She was also admired because, unlike other members of the Romanian team, she showed a great deal of expression in her choreography and a wide variety of complex skills in her routines. Sydney Olympics Răducan competed well at the Sydney Olympics, helping the Romanian women to win their first Olympic team gold medal since 1984. She qualified for the floor and vault event finals, and, along with her teammates Simona Amânar and Maria Olaru, the all-around finals. In the preliminary round of competition, she had the second highest all-around score of all competitors in the competition, trailing Russia's Svetlana Khorkina by 0.288. The all-around was mired in controversy. The vault was set 5 centimeters too low, creating a dangerous situation that completely altered the gymnasts' pre- and post-flights. As a result of the incorrectly set vault, many gymnasts suffered serious crashes and injuries during both the warm-ups and the competition, including Khorkina. The British gymnast Annika Reeder was hurt badly enough to withdraw from the remainder of the competition. Even those who escaped injury found themselves shaken by their experiences on the vault. When the error was discovered in the third rotation, International Federation of Gymnastics officials reset the vault height and allowed the competition to continue. They did permit the gymnasts who had vaulted in the first two rotations to take another turn on vault and to be rescored; not every athlete accepted this offer. Răducan was one of the gymnasts who had vaulted on the incorrectly set apparatus but did not suffer a fall on the event and performed without serious error. She continued through the competition, turning in strong performances on beam and floor, and ended up with the all-around gold medal. On the