PETROUNIAS Eleftherios

General
ANTI-BULLYING
He was bullied about his size when he was a child. "A lot of kids would make fun of me because I was short. Other kids could have fallen down with this and never got up, but I would just do a salto [somersault] and ask them, 'Can you do that?' and then say, 'I can, because I am short'. It was never a problem for me but I can understand that for a lot of kids it could be really tough. So, I am always trying to be at the front of the anti-bullying campaigns in Greece." (fig-gymnastics.com, 02 Jul 2018)

TIME OUT OF THE SPORT
He first got involved in gymnastics at age five, but at age 14 he took a three-year break from the sport. "For many years I was trying to be a good athlete and a good student. I was tired, my body was tired, my elbows were in trouble and I told my mother I wanted to stop. I wanted to see my friends and live like them. Be crazy, ride motorbikes, party, meet girls and have fun. For the next few years, I was just another teenager. One morning [at age 17] I thought about returning to the gym. When I went on the rings, my body remembered and began to operate as if it had never stopped. I was refreshed, stronger." (protothema.gr, 06 Apr 2015; lifo.gr, 24 Apr 2014)