Tokyo 2020: Olympic gymnast Max Whitlock says it was '10 times harder' retaining pommel horse gold

"It's 10 times harder getting a title after a title so I'm massively proud to do it," Max Whitlock on the pressure he felt to retain in pommel horse title

Gold medal winning gymnast Max Whitlock has said it was "10 times harder" retaining his pommel horse title in Tokyo than winning it for the first time in Rio 2016.

Whitlock said it was "surreal" after his successful defence secured him a sixth Olympic medal.

Speaking to ITV News after his victory, the 28-year-old gymnast from Hertfordshire revealed he was "the most nervous" he had ever been in a competition but that watching Team GB’s ongoing success had spurred him on to take his second consecutive pommel horse gold.

"What I realised, and I've only just realised it recently in Tokyo, was seeing all the teams come through with medals, with golds, achieving what they really want to achieve, achieving their dreams, and, as an athlete, because I've done it before, I could relate to their feeling, I could really know what that felt like. "And I feel that put huge amount of pressure on myself to try and get that again.

"It's 10 times harder getting a title after a title so I'm massively proud to do it."

"Crazy feeling," Gold medalist Max Whitlock on winning his sixth Olympic medal after his pommel horse victory

Whitlock, who threw down an early gauntlet to his competitors by going first on the pommel, said he felt “lost for words” after winning his sixth gold medal.

Whitlock posted a score of 15.583 that proved unbeatable, with Chinese Taipei’s Chih Kai Lee coming closest on 15.4, and Japan’s Kazuma Kaya winning bronze.

"I knew it was a high score and it was gong to be hard to beat, but I knew it wasn't impossible.

"I knew it was a tough final, there were a lot of strong competitors and great gymnasts, gymnasts with very high start scores," he said.

"It's crazy, it doesn't feel these are my results.

"It doesn't feel like it's me (when) people introduce me in that way," he told ITV News.

"It's a really strange feeling. Naturally, throughout my career, I've kind of put previous results to the back of my mind to try and forget about it to help me move forward.

"Standing here with my sixth Olympic medal is so surreal, crazy, I don't even know how to put it into words.

"It was one of the times I was actually lost for words, I didn't even know how to react after I'd won the medal."