What Is a Pak Salto?

The Pak salto is one of the defining bar-to-bar transitions in uneven bars, moving the gymnast from the high bar down to the low bar without ever touching the ground.

How it works

The gymnast hangs from the high bar, facing the low bar, and swings forward. As the swing rises, she lets go, turns a backward salto with her body straight (laid out) in the space between the two bars, and catches the low bar, arriving in support on it with her weight on straight arms, ready to continue.

The 2025–2028 WAG Code of Points lists it as “hang on HB, facing LB – swing forward, salto backward stretched between bars to clear support on LB”, element 3.404.

Value and variations

In the women’s Code, the first digit after the decimal point of an element’s number gives its difficulty column, so 3.404 is a D (0.4). Adding a full twist during the salto produces the Bhardwaj (3.504), an E.

Why it matters in a routine

The women’s Code sets four composition requirements on bars, each worth 0.50, and the first is “a flight element from the high bar to the low bar”. A Pak salto meets it on its own, which is one reason it appears in so many elite routines. The other requirements — a flight on the same bar, different grips, and a turn — have to come from other skills. See women’s uneven bars and composition requirements.

How to tell it apart

• Pak salto or Tkachev / Jaeger? A Pak salto ends on the low bar; a Tkachev or Jaeger re-catches the same bar.
• Pak salto or Shaposhnikova? Both are bar-to-bar flights, but in opposite directions: a Pak goes from the high bar down to the low bar, a Shaposhnikova from the low bar up to the high bar.

Why it’s named as it is

The skill is named after North Korean gymnast Pak Gyong-sil, who attempted the transition at the 1989 World Championships and performed a cleaner version of it at the 1991 World Championships, establishing this kind of high-to-low transition internationally.

For the wider family, see uneven bars release moves.