Nineteen-year-old Biles has a total of 14 world championship medals, making her the most decorated American female gymnast of all time.
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Russian Federation won silver with 176.688 points, and China took bronze with 176.003 points.
After Aly Raisman, Gabby Douglas, Simone Biles, Laurie Hernandez, and Madison Kocian secured the gold, congratulations from past Olympic gymnastics champions poured in via social media.
“We told Martha the name, and she started crying”, said Aly Raisman, 22, the two-time Olympian who is also the team’s captain. All five USA athletes advanced to individual finals later in the week.
Some 100,000 new tickets were taken up on Monday, much better than the average of 10,000 per day about two weeks before the Rio 2016 Games kicked off. Tonight is Phelps’ chance to reclaim the gold medal, which he won at the 2008 Beijing Games. The long wait time between sets, leading some commentators to say the USA team was being “iced”, had no impact on that team’s overall performance, with Biles leading the way by competing in each of the competition’s events.
A high school sophomore, she was one of 16 women, of all ages, who had been invited to the U.S. Olympic Table Tennis Trials in Greensboro, N.C., in February.
“What were you thinking?” she asked.
“I can’t believe what we did tonight”, said Biles, who could leave Rio with five gold medals.
Next up was Douglas, who’s almost three inches taller, at 21, than she was at the 2012 London Games.
At 4 feet 8, Biles isn’t ideally suited to the uneven bars, but she was solid.
The U.S.is competing in a rotation with China’s gymnasts. Here is Biles killing it mid-beam routine.
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“Simone and Lauri will come in my room at 9:30 and I literally have to get them out at 9:50 because if they get too hyper I won’t be able to fall asleep”, said Raisman, referring to teammates Simone Biles and Lauren Hernandez and her 10 p.m. bedtime.
