Simone Biles wins silver to end what could be her last Olympics : NPR

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PARIS — After 90 seconds of backflips and handsprings and twists, Simone Biles walked off the floor exercise mat to greet a crowd of competitors and coaches alike, all offering their celebration for what might have been the last Olympic routine of Biles’ sterling career.

Biles’ run at the 2024 Summer Olympic Games ended Monday with a silver medal in the floor exercise final. Her four medals (three gold and the silver) in this Olympics have cemented her legacy as the greatest gymnast in U.S. history, and perhaps — as her diamond-encrusted goat necklace suggests — the greatest of all time.

Biles, who is 27, has won seven Olympic gold medals and 11 Olympic medals overall, a total tied for the second most ever won by a gymnast. Coupled with 30 World Championship medals, she is the most decorated gymnast of all time.

And her performance at this Olympics is an emphatic exclamation point on her turnaround from the last Summer Olympics in Tokyo, where she suddenly lost her way in the air in the gymnastics version of the yips called “the twisties.” Rather than risk injury, Biles withdrew from several events and ultimately took two years off from gymnastics altogether. At times, she thought she would never compete again.

Instead, Biles made her return to competitive gymnastics in 2023. Since then, she has looked dominant. In Paris, she helped propel the U.S. to a blowout win in the team event, then staged a comeback in the individual all-around to earn gold by more than a point. On Saturday, she won the gold medal in the vault final after performing the most difficult vault in women’s gymnastics, which is named after her.

On Monday, even after a day in which she missed the podium in one event and settled for silver in another, Biles said she was satisfied with her performance in Paris. “I’ve accomplished way more than my wildest dreams, not just at this Olympics but in the sport,” she said. “A couple years ago, I didn’t think I’d be back here at an Olympic Games. So, competing and then walking away with four medals, I’m not mad about it. I’m pretty proud of myself.” 

Biles had been near flawless in this Olympic Games. Before Monday, she had won the gold medal in every event she entered.

But on the last day of artistic gymnastics competition, slips and falls beset competitors throughout the events held at Paris’ Bercy Arena. In the women’s balance beam final and the men’s horizontal bar final, the podiums were populated by the gymnasts who were able to get through their routines without mistake. In the floor exercise, several competitors fell or accidentally stepped out of bounds.

Biles was not immune. In the balance beam final, a flip layout midway through her routine proved too off-kilter, and Biles slipped and fell to the mat. Ultimately, her score of 13.1 was not enough to earn her a medal. Italy’s Alice D’Amato took the gold. China’s Zhou Yaqin won silver, followed by Italy’s Manila Esposito with bronze.

“Balance beam is such an unforgiving, uncertain event. Mistakes happen all the time,” Zhou said afterward. “I think the falters, falls, stumbles are because of the high pressure and the nature of balance beam.” The U.S. gymnast Suni Lee also participated in Monday’s beam final, but a bad fall during her routine doomed her chances too at a medal.

The sizable crowd was quiet, and at times spectators shushed the gymnasts as they tried to cheer on their competitors. “We didn’t like that, because it was just so silent in there,” Lee said. “When I was up there, you could probably hear me breathing. It adds to the stress.”

Another factor: The Olympics is a long and grueling competition. By Monday, gymnasts had been competing for more than a week. Biles, who participated in all but one possible event, performed an Olympics-high 17 routines throughout the competition. “I’ve been out on that floor so many times competing, so obviously exhaustion and all of that sets in,” she said.

The floor exercise gold medal went to Brazil’s Rebeca Andrade, who won by just 0.033 after Biles was docked six-tenths of a point for twice stepping out of bounds. U.S gymnast Jordan Chiles won bronze.

“I’m not very upset or anything about my performance at the Olympics. I’m actually very happy, proud and even more excited that it’s over,” Biles said afterward.

Now that her time at the Paris Olympics has come to a close, the question of her future has started to simmer. At 27, Biles is already older than most elite female gymnasts. After the 25-year-old Rebeca Andrade and 23-year-old Jordan Chiles, no competitor who faced Biles on Monday was older than 21. Most were still in their teens.

Biles has not said whether she intends to retire from gymnastics now that her Olympic run has ended. On Sunday, she chastised journalists for inquiring.

“You guys really gotta stop asking athletes what’s next after they win a medal at the Olympics,” she wrote on the social media site X. “Let us soak up the moment we’ve worked our whole lives for.” (When one user asked what her next step would be after Paris, Biles replied: “babysitting the medal.”)