Lia-Monica Fontaine wins vault silver in debut at artistic gymnastics world championships
Lia-Monica Fontaine won’t forget her first trip to the FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Championships any time soon. The 16-year-old from Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, Quebec won the silver medal in the women’s vault final on Friday in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Fontaine earned a score of 14.033 points for her two vaults, placing her behind neutral athlete Angelina Melnikova, who claimed the gold medal with 14.466 points. American Joscelyn Roberson took bronze with a score of 13.983.
“Coming into these worlds, like I know I’m pretty good on vault, so I was looking forward to doing the final, but I did not know that getting a medal would be possible,” Fontaine said of winning silver at her first world championships.
“It means a lot to me because I’ve been working so hard in the gym and showing that to everybody here, it just makes me very proud.”
Each apparatus final at the world championships features only the top eight athletes from the qualification round. Fontaine had ranked third among the qualifiers for the women’s vault final, in which each athlete must perform two different vaults.
For her first vault, Fontaine hit a double-twisting Yurchenko for a score of 13.933. She then went for a Lopez—roundoff, half on, front layout half off—which scored 13.733. Those points were averaged and a bonus of 0.2 applied for her final mark.
This is just Canada’s second ever world championship medal in women’s vault. Shallon Olsen also won silver in 2018.
In her first year of senior eligibility, Fontaine won four individual medals at the 2025 Pan American Championships this past June, including silver in the all-around and vault, gold in floor exercise, and bronze on uneven bars.
Also on Friday, Aidan Li, another world championship rookie, finished eighth in the men’s pommel horse final. He had qualified with the fifth-best score, the highest ever world championship ranking by a Canadian on the apparatus.
The world championships conclude on Saturday with five more apparatus finals, including Ellie Black competing in the beam final after she qualified in fourth place. The 30-year-old veteran is making her ninth world championship appearance.
