Rie Tanaka

Rie Tanaka won something in 2010 that most gymnasts never get near: the Longines Prize for Elegance. That detail tells you more than any medal table would. In a sport that keeps inflating difficulty scores, she made judges and audiences pay attention to line, extension and control — the parts of gymnastics that don't reduce neatly to numbers. Born in Iwade, Wakayama Prefecture in 1987 and trained at Nippon Sport Science University, she competed at the 2012 London Olympics before retiring. Her two brothers, Kazuhito and Yusuke, were also Olympic gymnasts, which makes the household one of the more remarkable athletic families Japan has produced. I find her career a useful argument against measuring athletes purely by hardware. Some competitors are remembered because of what they won; she is remembered because of how the movement looked, and that memory has proven surprisingly durable.

Name (English)

Rie Tanaka

Name (Japanese)

田中理恵

Reading

たなか りえ

Born

June 11, 1987 (age 39)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Gemini / Rabbit

Origin

Iwade, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan

Height

157 cm

Occupation

artistic gymnast / gymnast

University

Nippon Sport Science University

• Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/riiiiiie611/
• Xhttps://x.com/Rie17mamumu
• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rie%20Tanaka%20(gymnast)
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%94%B0%E4%B8%AD%E7%90%86%E6%81%B5%20(%E4%BD%93%E6%93%8D%E9%81%B8%E6%89%8B)
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5972329

Tags

• Wakayama Prefecture
• artistic gymnast
• gymnast

Last updated

2026-08-07

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.