Reborn Simone Biles leads way as USA reassert team gymnastics domination

In the utter chaos of the team final at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, when the sky seemed to fall and Simone Biles was forced to withdraw mid-race, the U.S. responded to the unexpected setback with admirable determination and finished with a silver medal, a performance that made them proud but left them hungrier than ever.

Each member of that team has had to overcome major challenges on the road back: balancing college gymnastics with their elite-level ambitions, serious injuries, a serious kidney disease, multiple stalkers, and untangling corners.

Four of them – Biles, Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey – remarkably found the strength and determination to make the team again, and three years later they cemented the US dominance of women’s gymnastics with an unassailable gold medal.

Their triumph was underscored by another stunning performance from Biles on a night that might have brought back flashbacks to her earlier struggles. In the team final in Tokyo, Biles’ attempt at the vault ended with her losing her footing in the air and nearly hurting herself badly before pulling out.

This time she completed a brilliant Cheng vault, setting the tone for an expert set of results. Biles said she was relieved not to experience any flashbacks: “At the beginning of the day I started therapy and I told her I felt calm and ready and that’s exactly what happened.

“But after I got done with the jump, I was relieved. I was like, ‘Whew, at least no flashbacks or anything.’ But I did feel a lot of relief and as soon as I landed, I was like, ‘Oh yeah, I’m definitely going to do this.'”

Chiles, who trains with Biles in Texas, had reacted to Biles’ jump by jumping into the air in glee: “That’s what I thought. I was like, ‘Hallelujah, no flashbacks or anything. Okay, like she just needs to do her normal thing.’

“I was just jumping up and down and it was just relief. From that point on, she’s been the biggest, biggest, so it was, ‘Okay, we’re really going to do this and just go out there and be ourselves.'”

After the U.S. team marched through the four apparatus with one fall, the evening ended with all eyes in the arena on Biles, who shined during the evening’s final routine and delivered a spectacular performance to take home the gold medal.

Returning to the top of women’s gymnastics, the U.S. has won gold at three of the past four Games. Biles, already the most decorated gymnast in history, now has five Olympic gold medals and 38 medals from world championships and Olympics. Her eight medals make her the most decorated American gymnast at the Games.

Biles said she enjoyed this team gold even more than she did in 2016. “It wasn’t as successful as it is now,” she said. “Now that I’m a lot older and we have so much more experience and we’re really having fun here and enjoying what we’re doing. It’s just different.”

While the United States celebrated, Great Britain was digesting the bitter feeling of finishing fourth, behind silver medallists Italy and Brazil, who finished 0.234 points ahead of Great Britain.

Georgia-Mae Fenton said: “We really, really stepped up from qualifying and it was so nice to see everyone put in their best performance. It’s devastating to miss out on such a close race.”

Three years after their surprise team bronze medal, Great Britain had endured a difficult year with many of their top gymnasts injured and their seventh place in the error-riddled qualifying series further underlined their distance from the best.

But from the floor exercise on, things were different. Their rotation on the uneven bars in qualifying was so bad that the gymnasts were making fun of themselves on social media the next day.

They recovered with a strong rotation, highlighted by a great performance from Fenton and another monster routine from Becky Downie, her score of 14.933 was the third highest in the competition at the time. They went to the balance beam in third place and were able to handle the pressure, running through three strong routines.

But it wasn’t enough. Rebeca Andrade’s spectacular jump in Cheng, two tenths higher than her qualifying attempt, was just enough for Brazil to eliminate them.

After their balance beam rotation, the British briefly thought they had won bronze before having to settle for fourth place. Fenton said: “We didn’t know the exact scores and Rebeca’s vault is absolutely insane. We had to fight against that.

“But I couldn’t be more proud of the way we stepped up and showed that we are still a fighting team.”