Gymnasts at Biles’ gym in Spring gathered to cheer on their hometown girl. Perhaps by beginning the conversation with talk about the best in history. She’s going to continue to do well at these Olympics.
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To achieve that status, Comaneci felt that 19-year-old would need to win more golds, or even sustain her levels of excellence for another four-year cycle to emulate the feats of Russia’s Larisa Latynina (1956-60) and Czech Vera Caslavska (1964-68) and win back-to-back Olympic all around titles. “I mean it is what it is.” said Biles. This medal is not just for me, it’s for a whole bunch of people who came before me and have been an inspiration for me – Maritza, Cullen – and it’s for all the people after me who believe they can’t do it and I just want to be an inspiration to others that we can do it. Other stars in action include Rafael Nadal, who is into the bronze medal match for singles, and Venus Williams, who teamed up with Rajeev Ram, and will play for the gold in mixed doubles. She looked strong in the team competition on Tuesday, and helped the U.S. win its gold medal – but Thursday was her real moment to shine.
“After they watch the Olympics, they come and they’re fired up and ready to go, ready to flawless their routines”, said Lisa Collins, women’s team coach. She was rolled off the arena’s competition floor in a wheelchair, with the crowd again chanting her name as she exited.
Some of her fellow competitors believe that’s exactly where the 4-foot-8 dynamo is heading.
Aly Raisman took silver, getting redemption after missing a medal on a technicality at the London games. Paseka claimed silver and Switzerland’s Giulia Steingruber pipped India’s Dipa Karmakar by 0.15 of a point to take bronze. Raisman said she remembers watching as a child when the USA achieved it the first time, at the 2008 Games in Beijing.
Physics-defying gymnast Simone Biles won her third gold medal of the Rio Olympics on Sunday, when she crushed her competition on the vault.
She launched her challenge by nailing a hard Amanar vault scoring 15.866 despite a wobbly landing, to lead Raisman by 0.233.
It gets a little trickier after that, if only because of unfortunate timing.
All-around is the summit of women’s gymnastics, a battle across vault, uneven bars, beam and floor between 24 of the sport’s top athletes. She went back in front with a 15.433 on beam – and capped it with a 15.933 on floor that Karolyi called “very close to perfection”.
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But Thursday’s silver, she said, “shows you should never let anyone tell you that you can’t do anything, and you should never give up just because you fail in something”. “Those are the culminations of our career”. For instance, while Switzerland’s Giulia Steingruber started strong with a 15.333, she scored a 14.900 on her second attempt, dropping her final score to 15.216. And Biles is now the fourth different American gymnast to win the Olympic all-around title in the past four Summer Games, an unprecedented streak by any nation. Gymnastics chose me. I’ve loved it every since. “It was just kind of a train wreck”.
