Soviet Gymnasts Take Sizable Lead

Romania’s Daniela Silivas had the first perfect score of the World Gymnastics Championships in Stuttgart, West Germany, but Svetlana Boginskaya was the best overall as the Soviet Union opened a sizable lead Monday, halfway through the women’s team competition.

Boginskaya, the reigning European champion and Olympic all-around bronze medalist, excelled on all four apparatus exercises and scored 39.837 out of 40 points.

At the end of compulsory exercises, the Soviet Union has 198.058 out of 200 points, ahead of Romania with 196.447 and China with 195.896.

The United States, led by Brandy Johnson, was in fourth place with 193.895. Johnson was eighth individually after the compulsories.

Silivas, 19, had a perfect 10 on the vault and continued to perform strongly on the other three compulsory events to finish with 39.699, edging China’s Yang Bo, who scored 39.649, for second place.