HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill. — Sunisa Lee walked out to the floor for podium training for the Core Hydration Classic on Friday carrying a giant backpack. Before she could take too many steps towards the competition areas, she was greeted by Jordan Chiles, her 2021 Olympic teammate, with a giant hug. Chiles’ infectious enthusiasm was apparent as she ran up to Lee, who is taking baby steps back to the sport where she won Olympic all-around gold in Tokyo.

“[It felt] so good. Jordan is one of the closest people to me. So to see her back out here and to just be back out and competing with her is so fun,” Lee said during training for the U.S. Classic, where many Team USA hopefuls are competing a year before the 2024 Olympics. That group includes Simone Biles, who is returning to the mat for the first time since the Tokyo Olympics, where she sat out of multiple events while dealing with the “twisties.”

The last time casual Olympic fans saw Lee, she was celebrating a breakout performance in 2021. She won gold in the all-around, helped the U.S team win silver and took bronze on the uneven bars. Like Biles and Nastia Liukin, Lee competed on “Dancing with the Stars,” where she finished fifth.

From there, Lee headed to Auburn to compete for the Tigers, as part of the first crop of Olympic athletes who were able to take advantage of NIL rules that allowed her to earn money after the Olympics and still compete in college.

Lee excelled in her first season at Auburn, drawing record crowds to their meets in 2022. She won an NCAA title on balance beam and took second in the all-around. NCAA gymnastics tends to focus more on the team outcomes. And between conference events and dual meets, collegiate gymnasts just compete more, which

“[NCAAs] definitely helped my consistency and a lot of like the mental side, because I feel like today I was coming in and I was really happy,” Lee said. “But when I got back up on the podium, and I was like worked up at first and then I was pretty calm, like recalling back to college, every single day, doing the same elements. And I’ve done this so many times.”

But throughout the 2023 season, Lee missed competitions due to a kidney condition. She announced that the ‘23 season would be her final one in college due to health issues, but she wasn’t moving on from her goal of getting back to the Olympics.

This weekend in Chicago, Lee is working to get back to elite form, even as she deals with a kidney condition that can hamper her training.

“My main goal was to just come here and compete,” Lee said. “I’m not worrying about winning or placing or anything. I just wanted to get back out here. I’m not doing full difficulty at all. I’m not competing floor [exercise].”

During podium training on Friday, Lee looked steady as she trained her balance beam, vault and uneven bars routines. The routines were on the easier side of what she can accomplish, but going viral for her latest skill isn’t the point. Showing the gymnastics world that she is progressing is.

As Lee works with doctors to control her kidney condition, she has to deal with a scaled-back training schedule. Lee told the Olympic Channel that she sometimes wakes up with fingers so swollen that she can’t put on the grips she needs to wear for the uneven bars.

“I am still kind of in and out of the gym. I don’t train as much as I used to. And I definitely don’t take as much time as I like, but whenever I’m having a really good day, I try and take advantage of that and do as much as I can,” Lee said. “Other days, I just work more basics, turns or dance elements because those are important, too.”

When her kidney condition started affecting her in January, Lee was on the exact path she wanted to be on to make it to Paris for the Olympics. Getting healthy enough to try out some of those new skills is part of why she is still pushing for Paris.

“I feel like there’s just a lot more in me. Before all of the diagnoses and all of that stuff, I was doing really good. I feel like I was coming up with new combinations, new skills, like it would have been really cool,” she said. “But that’s definitely what inspired me because I already know that I can do it. So if I just get myself back to that pace, I’ll be right on to the Olympics hopefully.”

Competing at the Classic is the first step that Lee, Chiles, Biles and all of the 2024 Olympic hopefuls will take. This event will qualify gymnasts to the U.S. Championships in San Jose in late August. From there, the top gymnasts will head to a selection camp where the world championship team will be chosen for the event in Belgium in early October.

img
Simone Biles returns to competition this weekend for the first time since the Tokyo Olympics. (Jon Durr/USA TODAY Sports)

For Lee, competing at the Classic is not just a step toward the Olympics, but that step she needs to take to show herself she can compete again, even if she’s not earning the highest scores.

“I’m not gonna be the perfectionist that I was before. It’s just gonna be really hard because, like, a lot of people have that pressure. But, and I think this time, it’s more like I’m coming back, but I also have the [Olympic] title. That kind of gets me a little bit worked up, but ever since I’ve gotten here, I’m just calming myself down. And I’m like, ‘Don’t put any pressure on yourself because we know that you’re not ready.’

“And like, I know what I’m capable of doing right now and it’s not gonna be like what I’m going to do. So I’m just giving myself time.”

Maggie Hendricks is a contributing writer for Just Women’s Sports. She also covers women’s sports for Bally Sports. Follow her on Twitter @maggiehendricks.

Simone Biles is getting back to competition for the first time since the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. The seven-time Olympic medalist is set to participate in the U.S. Classic in early August.

The event will be her first since the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The pattern follows a route similar to the one she took following the 2016 Rio Olympics, after which Biles took a two-year break before using the Classic as her comeback meet in 2018.

USA Gymnastics made the announcement Wednesday. The 2016 Olympic champion has taken the majority of the past two years off following the Tokyo Games. At those Games, she suffered from “the twisties” – which is when an athlete loses spatial awareness while airborne – and did not compete in multiple events.

She watched and cheered as her teammates won silver in the all-around. Biles returned for the balance beam, earning bronze and tying Shannon Miller for the most Olympic medals by an U.S. woman gymnast.

Biles has hinted at a comeback, saying in January that a potential return to gymnastics was “up in the air.”

“Obviously, mental health comes first. I’m still in therapy and I’m still doing everything so that I can be the best version of myself,” she said. “So I’ll be in Paris, but don’t know if that is on the floor with those girls or in the stands just cheering.”

Simone Biles got married (again) over the weekend, wedding NFL player Jonathan Owens in Mexico.

The pair first tied the knot at the 1910 Harris County Courthouse in Houston in April, then celebrated their marriage again in Mexico on Saturday.

The Mexico affair was star-filled and much more of a party. Biles told Vogue that because they were getting married in Mexico, they legally had to get married in the U.S. in order for it to be recognized.

“We had to get married ‘legally’ here in the U.S. since our wedding will be a destination wedding,” she said. But that doesn’t mean that the wedding process was all sunshine and rainbows.

“The planning process [for the larger celebration in Cabo] was so much fun in the beginning and then it started getting really stressful,” she continued.

During the service, Biles told Vogue she and Owens tried to keep things light, and that she “fell in love with him all over.” All in all, it was a magical wedding for the two, who got engaged last February in what she captioned “THE EASIEST YES.”

“Whales were jumping out of the water as our ceremony started,” Biles said. “Whale season is over by the way. It sprinkled for two minutes after we got married — which is good luck! — and we had a full moon. It was truly the most magical!”

Simone Biles remains “up in the air” on a potential return to gymnastics, she said in an event Thursday at her Houston gym.

In the same vein, the seven-time Olympic medalist has not decided if she will compete for a spot on Team USA at the Paris Games in 2024, per Houston Chronicle reporter Danielle Lerner.

Biles shared similar sentiments Monday while speaking at the National Retail Federation convention. When asked about the next Olympics, the 25-year-old said she is “trying to figure it out right now.”

“Obviously, mental health comes first. I’m still in therapy and I’m still doing everything so that I can be the best version of myself,” she said. “So I’ll be in Paris, but don’t know if that is on the floor with those girls or in the stands just cheering.”

While Biles competed for Team USA in the last two Summer Games, she withdrew from the team and individual all-around competitions in Tokyo in 2021, citing her mental health. She competed in the balance beam final, winning bronze.

“Sometimes if you make decisions, you might be the only one standing that believes in yourself,” Biles said. “At those times, you really have to dig deep and think of the reason why you’re doing it, who you are, what you stand for, what you want to accomplish.”

Megan Rapinoe and Simone Biles will receive the highest civilian honor when President Joe Biden bestows them and other notable figures with the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House on July 7.

The award is given out by the President to those who have “made exemplary contributions to the prosperity, values, or security of the United States, world peace, or other significant societal, public or private endeavors.”

Biles is the most decorated U.S. gymnast in history, having accrued seven Olympic medals and 25 world championship medals. The 25-year-old is also a “prominent advocate for athletes’ mental health and safety, children in the foster care system, and victims of sexual assault,” the White House said in a press release.

Rapinoe, a two-time World Cup champion and an Olympic gold medalist, is an outspoken advocate for LGBTQIA+ rights, gender equality and racial justice.

“In that moment I spoke to the President, I was, and still am, totally overwhelmed,” Rapinoe said about being notified of the honor on June 23. “I just think of all the people who I feel deserve a part of this medal, from my family to current and former teammates, all the women of the U.S. Women’s National Team throughout our history, to Colin Kaepernick, the three woman who founded Black Lives Matter – Opal, Alicia and Patrisse – to Marsha P, Sylvia and Billie Jean, the Williams sisters, of course my fiancé Sue Bird, and so many more.

“I am humbled and truly honored to be chosen for this award by President Biden and feel as inspired and motivated as ever to continue this long history of fighting for the freedoms of all people. To quote Emma Lazarus, ‘Until we are all free, we are none of us free.’”

Rapinoe is the first soccer player to receive the prestigious award, and Biles and Rapinoe are two of six total women’s athletes to be honored.

The duo join 15 others who will be recognized at the White House ceremony next Thursday, including actor Denzel Washington, former U.S. Senator John McCain, former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

Rapinoe will miss the USWNT’s second World Cup qualifier against Jamaica in Monterrey, Mexico for the ceremony.

“Megan is of course very disappointed about missing a game, but I told her to go,” said USWNT coach Vlatko Andonovski. “She has to go. This is a once-in-a-lifetime honor, she deserves it.”

Simone Biles will soon be headed to Tokyo, where she’ll join the rest of the Team USA gymnastics roster as they look to win gold. 

The International Gymnastics Federation released the draw for qualification round slots Wednesday, with Team USA drawing Subdivision 3 and starting on floor exercise. The week-long event will begin with the team competition before moving into individual competition.

Here’s when Simone Biles and the rest of Team USA Gymnastics competes (all times ET):

Saturday, July 24: The first day of qualification, Team USA will begin competition at 2:10 p.m.

Tuesday, July 27: The women’s team final, starting at 6:45 a.m.

Thursday, July 29: Women’s individual all-around competition begins, starting at 6:50 a.m.

Sunday, August 1: Women’s event finals — vault and bars, starting at 4 a.m.

Monday, August 2: Women’s event finals — floor, starting at 4 a.m.

Tuesday, August 3: Women’s event finals — beam, starting at 4 a.m.

Simone Biles leads the competition after day one of the U.S. Olympic gymnastics trials.

Looking to lock up her ticket to Tokyo, Biles dominated the field, holding a 2.899 lead at the end of Friday night. Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles and MyKayla Skinner round out the top four in the all-around standings.

Biles, in a league of her own, completed several skills named after herself during the trials. The first being her dismount on beam, as well as two “Biles” skills in her floor routine.

The final Olympic team will be named on Sunday night after the last day of trials airs at 8:00 p.m. ET on NBC.

The dominance of Simone Biles cannot be overstated. The 24-year-old gymnast has won the all-around gold medal at every single U.S. National Championship, World Championship, and Olympic Games she’s participated in since 2013, the first year she was eligible for senior level competition. And there is no sign that she has passed her peak. Her biggest competition in Tokyo this summer could very likely be herself. 

Can the GOAT outdo her own Olympic performance from four years ago at Rio? Here’s a breakdown of what she’ll need to accomplish in each event in order to do just that.

Floor

Biles’ most dominant event is arguably the floor exercise. She’s won the gold medal in this event at every World Championships of her career and also has five first place floor finishes at the national championship level. The last time she earned anything LESS than gold in this event was back in 2015. Needless to say, she’ll need gold on floor in Tokyo to match her Rio record.

Vault

If floor is her strongest event, then vault is not far behind. Again, you have to go back to 2015 to find anything other than a top podium finish for Biles on this apparatus. 

Six years of first place finishes later, there is zero let up in her pursuit of making the impossible possible. At the 2021 U.S. Classic in Indianapolis held in May, Biles debuted and landed the Yurchenko double pike, a stunt no female gymnast had ever before performed in competition. Although she’s displeased that the International Federation of Gymnastics isn’t willing to assign the stunt a value that matches many experts’ approximation of its difficulty, she’s determined to keep it in her line up. If she can get it dialed by Tokyo, chances are high she’ll repeat her gold in vault from four years ago.

Balance Beam

Beam is Biles’ third strongest event. In Rio, she earned the bronze medal, so it’s one of the few places she has the potential to improve in. And signs are pointing to her being on the right track. She wrapped up 2019 with a gold on beam at the World Championships and repeated that achievement at both the U.S. Classic and U.S. National Championships in 2021. If she’s going to outdo her 2016 self, a gold or silver on the balance beam would certainly help.

Uneven Bars

By far Biles’ most challenging apparatus is the uneven bars, which was the only individual event that she did not medal in at Rio. Her only gold medal in this event came at the U.S. National Championships in 2018 and there’s no indication of any recent breakthrough. But you can never really count her out, as indicated by her bronze medal finish in this event at last month’s national championships.

Team and Individual All-Around

Even though Olympic trials won’t occur until June 24-27, and there’s a greater than usual uncertainty about who will earn spots on Team USA alongside Biles, the US is already the favorite to take team gold in Tokyo. And Biles is the favorite-by-a-mile for the individual all-around. 

If her yet-to-be-named supporting cast can meet expectations and if the GOAT continues doing GOAT things, Biles has more than a solid chance of breaking the record for most gold medals in women’s gymnastics in a single Olympics, which she currently shares with four other gymnasts. 

Simone Biles does not believe USA Gymnastics has taken accountability for their actions.

In an interview with 60 Minutes, Biles detailed just how deep the issues run with the organization, revealing that as of right now, if she had kids, she wouldn’t let her children do gymnastics.

Biles was acutely candid in the interview, saying there would be nights at the Karolyi Ranch when the gymnasts would break into the cafeteria to get food because they were so hungry.

“There would be nights where we’re like, running with our hoodie up, and we would break into the cafeteria to eat,” she said, adding that she now knows that it’s not the right way to train.

But it didn’t stop there. Biles is one of the many gymnasts who publicly disclosed that they were abused by longtime USA Gymnastics physician Dr. Larry Nassar, who has since been sentenced to as many as 175 years in prison. 

“It’s far from over,” she said, when asked if the Nassar situation is behind them. “There’s still a lot of questions that still need to be answered.”

“Who knew what, when? You guys have failed so many athletes. And most of us underage. You guys don’t think that’s a bigger problem?”

When asked if she feels as though USA Gymnastics failed her, Biles responded: “One hundred percent.”

“We bring them medals. We do our part,” she continued. “You can’t do your part in return? It’s just, like, it’s sickening.”

“The way that USA Gymnastics is right now, if you had a daughter in a couple of years, would you want her to be part of that system?” Interviewer Sharyn Alfonsi then asked.

“No,” Biles responded. “Because I don’t feel comfortable enough, because they haven’t taken accountability for their actions and what they’ve done. And they haven’t ensured us that it’s never going to happen again.”

Simone Biles is in a league all her own.

Often referred to as the greatest of all time, Biles executes elements that boggle the minds of onlookers, fellow gymnasts and now physicists.

A super slow-motion video of Biles’ floor routine at the U.S. Gymnastics Championships is going viral, showing the gymnast appearing to defy gravity.

Biles’ remarkable floor routine has propelled her to a two-point lead going into the final day of the U.S. Gymnastics Championships.