Simone Biles tearing it up – even in practice
The four-time Olympic champion continues to share gravity-defying elements on social media
Artistic Gymnastics
It would be easy for Simone Biles, the 19-time World champion and four-time Olympic gold medallist, to rest on her laurels, especially now, when she expected to have already taken what would have surely been a star turn through the Tokyo Olympic Games.
But it shouldn’t be a surprise that the greatest female gymnast of all time, doesn’t take that approach.
Instead, as she’s returned to the gym after seven weeks away due to the coronavirus pandemic, Biles has continued to innovate, to push her sport forward – even from practice – and to share it all with the world on social media.
Her latest: a one-and-a-half twist step out to a double layout on the floor exercise posted last week.
“It’s kind of crazy,” Biles told the Olympic Channel in an Instagram live in July about the attention her gravity-defying posts have gotten. “I feel like in my mind, I’m just like, ‘OK, the gymternet will see this and then that’s as far as it will go. Then, it makes news. I’m like, what? That’s crazy.”
Biles has recently also shared posts of her performing a triple-twisting double back off the balance beam and a double layout connected to a double back.
“Gymnastics is hard, like especially to make those upgrades,” said Biles. “People keep coming up with crazier things and we’re doing harder things.”