Anyone could see this injury. It did not require a lifetime in gymnastics or an advanced degree in psychology. There was the slightest of limps on Sunday, and the sideline attention from USA Gymnastics trainers, and by Tuesday evening the wrap that enveloped Simone Biles’ left calf as she prepared to launch herself toward the ceiling of the Bercy Arena in Paris.
This is what we’ve seen for so many years in sports, to varying degrees: Michael Jordan’s flu game, Curt Schilling’s bloody sock, Willis Reed playing on that ragged knee. We may not be hearing for decades about Simone Biles’ calf injury, but then, it wasn’t even her own greatest triumph.
Biles’ presence in Paris was what mattered. Her sturdy performance was at the heart of the United States women’s return to the top of the Olympic world. She was called upon, even in her diminished state, to deliver on all four apparatus in the team event. One member of the team, Jade Carey, was entered only in the vault. The youngest gymnast, 16-year-old Hezly Rivera, didn’t even need to take off her warmup jacket to earn a gold medal.
Simone Biles rebounds from Tokyo
Biles came all the way back from Tokyo to earn her fifth Olympic gold medal, this one in the Paris 2024 team competition. It has been three years since her withdrawal from this competition in the previous Games, when her ailment was invisible, intangible, almost impenetrable. It was not, despite the persistent assertions of far too many, imaginary.
If only there were a more formidable name for “the twisties”, perhaps Biles’ experience in Tokyo would have been taken more seriously. Call it “airborne disorientation” or even “twistophobia”, and at least it wouldn’t sound like a sugary breakfast cereal. Perhaps then sports commentators in her home country would not have equated her withdrawal to quitting. Perhaps then there wouldn’t still be fools on social media using that same word to demean her as she led her teammates to conquest.
“The best way I can describe it,” Biles told podcast host Alex Cooper, “is every day you drive a car. If one day you woke up and had no idea how to drive a car, your legs are going crazy, you have no control over your body – that’s kind of how it feels like.”
There is no prescribed recovery period for something like this. A high ankle sprain, we know might take a month or more to heal. Being uncertain where one’s body is in space while soaring upside down a dozen feet above the floor? The typical cure for that is to no longer soar upside down a dozen feet above the floor.
Biles could have done that. Various internet sites estimate her net worth at $20 million, and it’s probably significantly more. Her husband, Jonathan Owens, signed a two-year deal to play safety for the Chicago Bears that guarantees him $1.5 million and could be worth $4.75 million. As the documentary “Simone Biles Rising” revealed, the couple are building a lovely home in the Houston area that still could use a bit of her attention.
DECOURCY: Biles still flying high as one of USA's greatest Olympians
Instead, she could not leave it that way. She had nothing of which to be ashamed, but a champion could not help but be frustrated, dejected. Even though she returned to the Tokyo Olympics to compete on balance beam, even though she showed the kind of heart in that moment that ought to be legendary, a bronze medal is not the way to end the greatest career in gymnastics history.
This was. (Although, in the all-around competition Thursday and the apparatus finals after that, there is more to complete). Biles was draped in the American flag, standing between Suni Lee and Jordan Chiles, smiling bright enough to light the Eiffel Tower after her posted floor exercise score made it official that the United States placed first.
Biles was the last gymnast to perform; not just the last American, but the last whose routine would be judged and tallied. Her score of 14.66 on the floor might have been generous, given she stepped out of bounds on her penultimate tumbling pass, but she’d needed to fall off the platform for Italy to have any chance to pass the Americans.
The U.S. wanted as much of Simone Biles as she could provide, but they never needed all of Simone Biles. Chiles and Lee were consistent enough that Biles could tone down her vault routine and wobble on the beam and still contribute to the victory. The first six scores, three each on vault and uneven bars, were all 14.366 or higher. From there, the lead was large enough that avoiding disaster was the primary objective. Chiles’ fall upon mounting the balance beam was as close as anyone came. The lead remained secure.
MORE: Full schedule, TV info for gymnastics all-around, individual finals
When Biles came all the way back from her ailment to compete at the 2023 World Championships, she ruled with four more titles, bringing to 23 the total of world gold medals she had earned. There were four more at the Rio Olympics in 2016. She now has more Olympic medals than any U.S. gymnast.
Did any of them mean as much as this? It’s the one that shows all who dared to call her a quitter how ignorant they were. Or are. Anyone could see that.