ANTWERP, Belgium — Naturally, there were jitters in the air. Considering all that took place, it is impossible for there not to be.
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When Simone Biles came onto the floor at a suburban Chicago arena in late July for her first gymnastics competition in two years, she was aware that a lot of people were curious about how the competition was going to go. “Don’t worry, I thought that too,” Biles added with a giggle. “I thought that too.”Â
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At the conclusion of one circle, the gymnast who holds the record for the most medals ever won recognized that she had returned to her “safe space.” A national champion by the time the month of August came to a close. Once more. She became a global champion by the month of October. Once more. And at the end of the year, she had been named the Female Athlete of the Year by the Associated Press.
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Yes, once more.
Biles became the sixth woman in history to win the Associated Press award for a third time; her victorious comeback featured a record-breaking eighth U.S. national title as well as a sixth gold medal in the global all-around competition. Caitlin Clark, a basketball standout from Iowa, and Aitana Bonmati, a member of the Spanish soccer team that won the World Cup, came in second and third, respectively, in the vote conducted by a panel of sports media experts. The 26-year-old athlete has medaled seven times in the Olympic Games.
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And to think that she wasn’t really sure what was going to happen to her on that June night in front of a crowded stadium that was supporting her at every step, a reaction that she claims she didn’t expect. She is difficult to blame. She was earning a bronze medal on the balance beam at the end of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics after a turbulent two weeks in which her decision to pull out of multiple finals due to “the twisties” (think mid-air vertigo) dragged the sometimes uncomfortable conversation about athletes and their mental health into the white-hot spotlight that only the Games provide. The last time Biles had saluted the judges, she was doing so at the end of the Olympics.
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While she received almost unanimous praise for her bravery in prioritizing her own safety, a cursory examination of her remarks on social media revealed that not everyone was in agreement with her decision. As a result of the event, she went into what she referred to as a “protective shell” and took a two-year break from her career. The more she delved into treatment, the more she looked forward to a return on her own terms. Nevertheless, it did not prevent feelings of self-doubt from surfacing. The only difference was that this time, rather than allowing the fear to eat away at her self-assurance, she acknowledged its existence, took a deep breath, and put on the type of performance that is uniquely hers and hers alone from now on. “I did a lot better than I thought I would do,” Biles told reporters.
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The same as it really was. There were instances in Biles’s life that she hardly remembers, such as when she received the Associated Press award in 2016 and 2019. Her performance in the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, which made her a household name, occurred while she was still a teenager. Continuing to reside in the same house as her parents. When she was younger, her whole life centered around the spaceship of a gym that her family had constructed in the suburbs of Houston. When she finds herself thinking about it, she can’t help but give a little shake of her head. According to Biles, she was under the impression that the only time she had was to train and, if she was fortunate, have her nails done.
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The situation is no longer like that. As a matter of fact, she has made it a priority to ensure that the sport that she has redefined does not now define her. During the spring, Biles tied the knot with Jonathan Owens, a safety for the Green Bay Packers. Her time is divided between attending Packers games when her schedule permits, working with her company partners, and taking the time to carefully examine the specifics of the home that she and her husband are in the process of constructing. Part of her development is a natural process. A portion of it is done on purpose. Over the course of an excessively lengthy period of time, she allowed herself to become too preoccupied with the results of each and every turn, flip, twist, and practice in a field in which perfection is essentially unachievable.Â
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“Whenever I was 19, it was the end of the world if I had bad days,” according to her. “Now I’m like, ‘It’s OK, it’s just gymnastics and I’ll come back tomorrow and we’ll get it started again.'” When Biles claims that she is attempting to adopt a more “one day at a time” attitude, she is not joking. This is not an easy task for someone who acknowledges that she has a propensity of “best case/worst case” every little thing. Until late spring, when coach Cecile Landing suggested over margaritas that maybe it was time to offer the world a glimpse of what Biles had been working on, she did not really start to take the idea of returning to the competition seriously.
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She responded with something along the lines of “sure, OK” despite the fact that there was a part of her that believed she would never be ready for the situation. “I didn’t know what I was expecting,” said Biles, who commended the individuals she has surrounded herself with for believing in her while she was still struggling to believe in herself. “I didn’t know what I was expecting,” she added. “People were like, ‘No, we’ve seen you in training, this is what was supposed to happen.'” Furthermore, what was anticipated to take place in a short amount of time turned out to be something that has nearly always taken place ever since Biles started bending the standards of her sport to her whim.
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It wasn’t simply that she triumphed; it was also the manner in which she did it. Her gravity-defying and complicated tumbling has evolved to be performed with more precision. In spite of the fact that she has been competing at the highest level for a decade, her routines for all four events continue to be very challenging. In no other aspect of gymnastics is this difficulty more obvious than on vault, when she made history by being the first woman to do a Yurchenko double-pike in an international competition. A magnificent mix of strength and more than a little guts, the move is now the sixth element to bear her name in the sport’s code of points. It is a move that combines power and more than a little guts. She is not need to do that in order to win. In spite of this, she continues to do it because, as she said a few years ago, she is able to.
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For the next summer, a third trip to the Olympics is on the horizon, barring any injuries or unanticipated events. She is aware of this. Rather than discussing it, she would rather not do so. It is a very deliberate decision on her part to only mention the terms “Paris” or “Olympics” in interviews, and she does it somewhat reluctantly. The fact that Biles just posted an Instagram story in which she requested her fans to share their favorite memory from 2023 is illustrative of the current state of affairs in her own life. The photograph that she selected was not taken from a routine or a platform at a medal ceremony; rather, it was a picture of her and Owens dancing at their wedding reception. It was an image of a life that was finding its equilibrium. “At the end of the day I did worlds and all that stuff, but I did get married, I got to support him,” according to her. “It’s just like, it’s kind of nice that gymnastics isn’t the main revolving piece.”
