Italy's Sofia Raffaeli on Thursday topped the list of 24 rhythmic gymnasts vying for a spot in the individual all-around finals at Paris, ending the day with 139.100 points and ahead of world No 1 Darja Varfolomeev of Germany.
An Olympic medal event since the Los Angeles 1984 Games, rhythmic gymnastics sees athletes perform exquisite manoeuvres to music while using hoops, balls, clubs or ribbons.
Raffaeli strutted onto the floor at the Porte de La Chapelle Arena, before leaping into her hoop routine. She twirled and twisted into hoop, at one point flipping it while she had her foot on back of her head to the cheers of spectators.
"The crowd helped me so much," said Raffaeli, who in 2022 won the World all-around, hoop, ball, ribbon and team gold medals. Italy have medalled three times in group all-around Olympic rhythmic gymnastics, but never in the individual event.
She knows she needs to stay focused in Friday's final because the gap between her and the nine other finalists is slim.
World No 1 Germany's Varfolomeev lost points in the second rotation of qualifiers, when her hoop rolled away and she had to think quickly, grabbing the spare hoop on the side of the floor.
Varfolomeev, who had been far ahead of the pack in the first rotation with a strong ball score of 36.450, redeemed herself in the next two rotations to finish the day in second place with 136.850 points.
Her compatriot Margarita Kolosov came in fifth after a complicated, crowd-pleasing club routine to the thumping bass of LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem". Clubs are a particularly difficult apparatus because there are two of them to wrangle, often moving asymmetrically.
Rhythmic gymnasts from Ukraine, Bulgaria and Brazil also shone on Friday, in the first Olympics since 1992 without Russia, historically a dominant force in the sport.
Boryana Kaleyn of Bulgaria, who turns 24 this month and was the 2023 European all-around champion, performed a fluid ball routine to "Never Enough" from the musical "The Greatest Showman", before ultimately taking third place for the day with a score of 136.450.
Bulgaria, who have medalled five times at the Olympics, won gold in the group all-around event at the Tokyo Games.
A jaunty version of Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" that had the spectators cheering and clapping to the beat accompanied Brazil's Barbara Domingos' ribbon routine, helping her qualify in eighth place. Her country has never medalled at the Olympics but on Thursday she was a crowd favourite.