Excelling once again, Simone Biles will lead U.S. Olympic gymnastics team: NPR

MINNEAPOLIS – For most gymnasts, slipping off the balance beam, stepping one foot out of line while performing a floor exercise and taking too many steps after landing a vault can be enough to spoil their chance at victory.

But we are talking about Simone Biles.

For Biles, already the most decorated gymnast in history at age 27, a somewhat shaky night at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials was still enough to stay ahead of her rivals by more than 5.5. points – and will officially secure a spot on the team that will compete at this summer’s Games in Paris.

And the crowd didn’t mind the slip. Following her floor routine, her final performance of the night, Biles walked off the podium to a standing ovation from the 16,000 people packed in the stands at the Target Center in downtown Minneapolis.

Olympic gold is the next cornerstone that awaits Biles in her remarkable return to dominance after a two-year hiatus from competition. In 2021, she was forced to withdraw from several events in Tokyo after experiencing “the twisties”, a psychological phenomenon in which a gymnast loses the ability to control her body in mid-air. He has said that the two-year break was necessary for his mental health.

Biles will enter the Paris Olympics as a favorite to win gold medals in the individual all-around, vault and floor exercise.

In Paris, she will be joined by Tokyo Games all-around gold medalist St. Paul native Suni Lee, who shined in front of a friendly hometown crowd Sunday night.

Two other Olympic veterans, Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey, will return for their second Games. The team includes newcomer Hazley Rivera, who turned 16 earlier this month. Two alternate players, Jocelyn Roberson and Leanne Wong, will also travel with the team.

The women’s team won gold in the team all-around in 2012 and 2016, then finished second at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 after Biles withdrew from the event.

The women’s trial was at risk of injury.

A series of injuries plagued the women’s trials before and on the first day of competition. First, Sky Blakely suffered an Achilles injury during pre-competition training on Wednesday; Blakely’s second-place finish at the US Gymnastics Championships boosted her stock for potential Olympics.

Then, on Friday, Shilis Jones, another favorite to join the Paris team, sprained her knee while warming up on vault. A few minutes later, the third gymnast, Kayla DiCello, was forced to leave the competition in a wheelchair after injuring her Achilles on the vault.

The back-to-back injuries on Friday left the remaining competitors shocked. Suni Lee, who was in line to vault immediately after DiCello, had to wipe away tears before stepping onto the stage.

“There’s a fear in a lot of athletes when you see someone get injured, and you don’t want it to be you,” Check for references first Chiles said this on Friday after the injuries to Jones and DiCello. “But I try to keep it in the back of my mind because I don’t want to think about it all the time.”

The US men’s gymnastics team is heading to Paris hoping to win its first team medal since 2008

The men’s team was announced on Saturday night. The five competitors, led by Olympic veteran Brodie Malone and newcomer (and social media star) Fred Richard, are heading to Paris with the goal of winning the first U.S. team medal in gymnastics since 2008.

“We should not just aim for medals. We should aim for gold and we are going to achieve something,” Richard said on Saturday.

Richard, 20, had the top score at the U.S. team trials, while Malone, 24, finished second. Paris will also be joined by Asher Hong, Paul Judah and Stephen Nedoroszky, as well as Shane Wiscus and Khoi Young.

A secondary goal for the team – besides a return to the team medal podium – is simply to raise the profile of men’s gymnastics, a sport that has long been overshadowed by its female counterparts.

“If we go to Paris and get a team medal as we’ve been training, it will stoke that fire even more,” Hong said Saturday.