Melita Ruhn

Melita Ruhn
Melita Ruhn in 1980
Personal information
Country represented	Romania
Born	(1965-04-19) 19 April 1965 (age 51) Sibiu, Romania
Height	156 cm (5 ft 1 in)
Discipline	Women's artistic gymnastics
Head coach(es)	Béla Károlyi
Assistant coach(es)	Marta Károlyi
Former coach(es)	Ana Crihan, Adrian Goreac
Choreographer	Geza Poszar
Retired	1982
Medal record Olympic Games 1980 Moscow Team competition 1980 Moscow Vault 1980 Moscow Uneven bars World Championships 1979 Fort Worth Team competition 1979 Fort Worth All around 1979 Fort Worth Floor

Melita Ruhn (later Fleischer, born 19 April 1965) is a retired Romanian artistic gymnast who represented Romania at the 1980 Summer Olympics. She belongs to the German minority in Romania. She won three Olympic medals (team, vault, uneven bars) for Romania and scored a perfect ten for the vault optionals in the team competition of the 1980 Olympic Games. In 1979 she was a member of the first world gold medal winning team of Romania. She is also an all around and floor world bronze medalist.

Ruhn took up gymnastics aged seven at Sport School Club Sibiu coached by Ana Crihan and Adrian Goreac. Later she trained with the national team in Deva under coach Béla Károlyi. Her first major international competition was the 1979 European Championships in Copenhagen where she placed fifth in the all-around final event.

Together with Nadia Comăneci, Rodica Dunca, Emilia Eberle, Dumitriţa Turner and Marilena Vlădărău, Ruhn was a member of the gold-winning team at the 1979 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. This was the first time that Romania won the team event at the world championships and the second time the Soviet team had not won the world or the Olympic title since 1952. Melita did all the four events and contributed with a difficult and risky routine on the uneven bars. Individually she won the bronze medals in the all around and in the floor event and placed seventh on vault and eighth on balance beam.

In 1980 she was a member of the silver-winning Romanian team at the 1980 Olympic Games. She revealed for a newspaper that just before the Moscow Olympics she fractured her ankle. The ankle was put in a cast, and coach Károlyi took it off before the vault event. She scored a 10 and the cast was placed back on her ankle. Besides winning silver with the team she won the bronze medal on vault and on uneven bars. The bronze on the uneven bars was a tie with Steffi Kraker and Maria Filatova.