Simone Biles competes at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 on Aug. 3, 2021 in Tokyo.
Case in point, one online theory posited that Biles was struggling because her family couldn’t be in Tokyo to support her. The reality? “My mom nags me every five minutes trying to call me, so I feel like she’s right here,” Biles said. Another theory wondered if Biles had been forced to leave her ADHD medicine at home, owing to Japan’s strict rules on what can be brought into the country, and maybe that had affected her.
Something that did affect Biles, however, was that she woke up one morning to learn an aunt had died unexpectedly back home.
“You guys have no idea what we’re going through,” Biles said.
What helped was that most of the reaction to Biles’ situation had been supportive, especially among fellow elite athletes. One day Biles stopped into the Olympic Village to buy some souvenirs at the store there, and she became so overwhelmed by the parade of athletes coming to offer their appreciation that the tears started flowing.
“I’m definitely feeling love and support,” she said, “and I didn’t feel like that was going to happen.”
Even as this frenzy engulfed Biles’ world, she never gave up hope that she could return to competition. She continued practicing, while also having a medical evaluation each day. In addition, she met twice a day with a sports psychologist provided by the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee. All of this helped. The twisties didn’t just go away, though.
“Every time I watch the guys and the girls out there I want to puke,” Biles said. “Every time I watch them do a double-double, because I cannot fathom how they’re doing it. I don’t understand.”
As finals approached, Biles withdrew from the all-around, then the bars, floor and vault finals. On Monday, with the deadline closing in to set the lineup for the beam final, Biles got her clearance. She was in.
Landi never questioned her star pupil.
“I could see it in her eyes,” Landi said. “She doesn’t need to please us, she doesn’t need to do anything for us. I could see in her eyes she wanted to do it.”
Biles still isn’t free from the twisties. She’s the only person in the world who can do a double-twisting, double back dismount. That was a nonstarter. Even the full-twisting double back she had done earlier in competition was too much. Instead, she changed her dismount to the easier double pike, which doesn’t involve any spins.
The two times Biles previously competed in Tokyo were in-demand events for the limited number of delegation officials allowed into the arenas. Tuesday night might have been even more intense. A crowd that included International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and Olympic figure skater Adam Rippon, who is working here as a broadcaster, were in-house at the Ariake Gymnastics Centre. The largest mass of people gravitated to the southwest corner, where the balance beam was set up.
Biles had looked confident in training before the meet. When it started, Biles sat in a folding chair, calmly watching the first two gymnasts. At her turn, the gymnast closed her eyes took a deep breath, then climbed onto the podium like she has done so many times over the past nine years.
Suddenly, the world that had once seemed so chaotic felt normal again.
Biles mounted the bean and confidently spun three times while knelt on one foot — called a wolf turn. She then marched through each element with her usual authority. Though she missed a connection between elements and had to check her balance at one point, she was otherwise the same gymnast who had never failed to reach the podium in six previous balance beam finals at the Olympics and world championships.
