Simone Biles

• 1. Introduction

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  Simone Biles was six years old when a day-care field trip brought her to a gymnastics gym for the first time. Nobody around her expected that visit to matter. Decades later, sports writers would call her one of the greatest athletes alive. The same body that made her nearly untouchable in competition once turned against her in mid-air, in front of a global audience. She walked off the competition floor at the biggest meet of her career and explained her reasons only afterward. Before any of that, she was a child moved between foster homes and eventually adopted by her own grandfather. How did a day-care field trip lead to a record book no other gymnast has matched? What made her stop competing when she was favored to win nearly every event? And what did she eventually decide to say about the man who was supposed to protect her, instead of harming her?

• 2. A Childhood Passed Between Homes

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  Columbus, Ohio, was where Simone Arianne Biles was born on the 14th of March 1997, the third of four siblings. Her birth mother, Shanon Biles, could not care for her children, and all four went in and out of foster care. In 2000, Biles's grandfather Ron Biles and his wife Nellie Cayetano Biles began caring for the children temporarily, in the Houston suburb of Spring, Texas. By 2003, the couple had formally adopted Simone and her younger sister Adria. Ron's sister Harriet adopted the two oldest children. Biles holds Belizean citizenship through her adoptive mother and calls Belize her second home. The family is Catholic.

  At Benfer Elementary School in Harris County, Texas, Biles began her early education before switching paths entirely. In 2012, she left public school for home schooling, which let her raise her training from about 20 to 32 hours a week. She earned her high-school diploma in mid-2015. On the 4th of August 2014, Biles verbally committed to UCLA. That November, she signed a National Letter of Intent, planning to enroll after the Rio Olympics. Instead, on the 29th of July 2015, she announced she would turn professional, giving up her college eligibility.

  Bannon's Gymnastics became her training home after instructors recommended she pursue the sport further. She began working with coach Aimee Boorman when she was eight years old. That partnership would carry her through her first elite competitions, which started in 2011.

• 3. A Record Nobody Else Holds

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  Eleven Olympic medals belong to Biles, tying her with Věra Čáslavská as the second-most decorated female Olympic gymnast in history. Only Larisa Latynina has won more, and no U.S. gymnast has won as many medals as Biles. At the Olympics, she has won the individual all-around title twice, in 2016 and 2024. She is also a two-time vault champion, the 2016 floor exercise champion, and the 2024 floor silver medalist. On balance beam, she has taken bronze twice, in 2016 and 2020. Biles led the gold medal-winning U.S. teams nicknamed the "Final Five" in 2016 and the "Golden Girls" in 2024.

  Thirty World Championship medals make Biles the most decorated gymnast in that competition's history. All but seven of those medals are gold. She is a six-time world all-around champion, with titles in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2019, and 2023. She has also won six world floor exercise titles, four balance beam titles, and two vault titles, each a record for the event. Five separate U.S. teams she competed on won World team gold, another record. Her four silver and three bronze medals at the Worlds round out a medal count no other gymnast has matched.

  Nine U.S. national all-around titles belong to Biles, along with seven national titles apiece on vault, balance beam, and floor exercise. She is also a two-time national uneven bars champion. She is the only woman to sweep all five national golds in a single championship, and she has done it twice, in 2018 and 2024. Biles is the sixth woman in gymnastics history to hold the Olympic and World individual all-around titles at the same time. That feat had not been matched since Lilia Podkopayeva achieved it in 1996. She is also the tenth woman, and the first American woman, to win a World medal on every apparatus. That combination had last been achieved by Daniela Silivaș, across a single Olympics or World Championships, in 1988.

  Those medals came from skills so difficult that Biles remains the only gymnast to have attempted several of them in competition.

• 4. Skills Only She Attempts

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  A vault difficulty score of 6.0 was given to the skill named "Biles" after she premiered it at the 2018 World Championships. It is a Yurchenko half-on entry followed by a forward layout salto with a double twist off the table. Biles II is a harder vault, with a double piked salto backward off the table. It carries a difficulty of 6.4 and debuted at the 2023 World Championships. In May 2021, at the U.S. Classic, she became the first woman to complete a Yurchenko double pike vault in competition. The skill was given a preliminary difficulty score of 6.6.

  On balance beam, the skill named "Biles" is a backward double-twisting double tucked dismount. It carries a difficulty of 0.8 and was first performed at the 2019 World Championships. On floor exercise, an earlier "Biles" element, a backward double layout salto with a half twist out, dates to the 2013 World Championships and carries a difficulty of 0.7. A second floor element, Biles II, is a backward triple-twisting double tucked salto. It is rated J, the sport's highest difficulty letter, worth 1.0 points, and was first performed at the 2019 World Championships. It is the only element in artistic gymnastics, for men or women, ever given that top rating.

  Hillary Heron of Panama became, at the 2023 World Championships, the only other gymnast ever to perform one of Biles's named skills in international competition. Ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics, Biles submitted a new uneven bars skill for the Code of Points, a Weiler kip with a pirouette and a half. Landing it would have made her the only woman with a named skill on every apparatus. She never competed it.

• 5. The Twisties

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  Biles arrived at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, held in July and August 2021, favored to win up to four of six possible golds. During the qualification round, she bounced entirely off the floor while landing a tumbling pass, and stepped a foot off the mat on her vault. Despite those mistakes, she still qualified first in the all-around, and she was the only athlete to qualify for every individual final. She wrote on Instagram that she was feeling "the weight of the world" on her shoulders.

  During the team final, Biles balked mid-air on her vault, twisting only one and a half times instead of the planned two and a half. She scored 13.766, well below her usual mark, then briefly left the competition floor before returning minutes later. She withdrew from the rest of the team competition, citing her mental health. She later said she was inspired by fellow Olympian Naomi Osaka, who had withdrawn from the French Open and Wimbledon earlier that year. The U.S. team went on to win silver, behind the athletes competing for Russia.

  On the 28th of July 2021, Biles withdrew from the all-around final, again citing mental health. Two days later, she also withdrew from the vault and uneven bars finals. On the 31st of July, she withdrew from the floor final too. On the 2nd of August, she confirmed she would compete in the balance beam final after all. She performed a scaled-down routine with an easier dismount and won the bronze medal, behind China's Guan Chenchen and Tang Xijing. That medal tied her with Shannon Miller for the most Olympic medals ever won by an American female gymnast, at seven. It also tied her with Larisa Latynina for the most combined Olympic and World medals ever won by a woman, at 32. Biles called the beam bronze her most meaningful medal, and later revealed that her aunt had died unexpectedly two days before that final.

  Biles described the twisties as a loss of air awareness while performing twisting elements. She had felt it before on vault and floor, but never before on bars or beam. She said she decided to stop after the team final's first rotation because she felt she had "simply got so lost" her safety was at risk. A team medal was at risk too. Juntendo University let her practice quietly at a gym an hour outside Tokyo during that week. Some commentators called her a quitter. Russian state media aimed racist, sexist, and transphobic remarks at her, along with fresh accusations that she was doping. Other gymnasts publicly defended her. Her decision to prioritize mental health was widely praised, credited with opening a broader conversation among Olympians about the same issue. Other athletes in Tokyo that summer began speaking more openly about their own struggles, following her lead.

• 6. Speaking to Power

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  On the 18th of January 2018, Biles said that Larry Nassar, a former USA Gymnastics team physician, had sexually assaulted her. She also said USA Gymnastics had helped cover up his abuse. Biles did not attend Nassar's sentencing hearings, held from the 16th to the 24th of January 2018, saying she "wasn't emotionally ready to face Larry Nassar again." She and other survivors received the Arthur Ashe Courage Award later that year. At the 2018 U.S. National Championships, Biles wore a teal leotard she had designed herself, as a statement of unity with survivors of Nassar's abuse. On the 15th of September 2021, Biles testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. She said she blamed "the entire system" for enabling Nassar's crimes, and that USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee "failed to do their jobs." Teammates McKayla Maroney, Maggie Nichols, and Aly Raisman testified alongside her that day.

  In September 2016, after the Russian hacking group Fancy Bear leaked her medical information, Russian media accused Biles of doping. She responded on Twitter by disclosing that she had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and had received a therapeutic use exemption to take medication for it. The disclosure earned her praise for speaking openly about ADHD. In September 2017, after her medical records were leaked again, Biles confirmed she had been taking the medication Ritalin to treat the condition during competition. She said ADHD was "nothing to be ashamed of and nothing that I'm afraid to let people know."

  In February 2021, Biles publicly criticized ESPN's SportsCenter for excluding women from a segment on the greatest athletes of all time. That September, she was named to the Time 100, an annual list of the world's most influential people, for what the magazine called her work "championing mental health." Raisman, one of her fellow witnesses that day, was represented by the same sports agency, Octagon, that Biles had signed with in July 2015.

• 7. Life Off the Mat

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  Biles did not compete at all during 2017, a rare full year away from the sport. That year, she co-wrote an autobiography with journalist Michelle Burford, titled Courage to Soar: A Body in Motion, A Life in Balance. The book reached number one on the New York Times bestseller list for young adult titles the week of the 8th of January 2017, and was later adapted into a television biopic. Biles also competed on season 24 of Dancing with the Stars, partnered with professional dancer Sasha Farber. She was eliminated on the 15th of May 2017, one week before the finale, finishing in fourth place. That August, her longtime coach Aimee Boorman moved to Florida, and Biles hired a new coach, Laurent Landi, that October.

  In November 2015, Biles announced a sponsorship deal with Nike. Later that same year, she signed a deal letting GK Elite Sportswear sell a line of leotards bearing her name, and another with Core Power to join its roster of athlete spokespeople. After the 2016 Rio Games, she signed endorsement deals with Procter & Gamble, the Hershey Company, and United Airlines. In 2016, she also became a spokesperson for Mattress Firm's foster-home support program and for Beats By Dr. Dre, and signed a deal with Spieth America to design gymnastics equipment. In April 2021, Biles left Nike for a new apparel sponsorship with Gap's Athleta brand.

  Biles dated fellow gymnast Stacey Ervin Jr. from August 2017 to March 2020. She began dating American football player Jonathan Owens in August 2020, after the two met on the dating app Raya. Biles announced her engagement to Owens on the 15th of February 2022, and the couple married on the 22nd of April 2023.

  In June 2025, Biles underwent breast augmentation surgery and has spoken openly about the procedure. She has also discussed other cosmetic surgeries, including a lower blepharoplasty and earlobe surgery. On the 7th of July 2022, Biles became the youngest person ever to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, presented by President Joe Biden alongside 16 other honorees, including soccer player Megan Rapinoe. Biles has also won the Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year award four times, in 2017, 2019, 2020, and 2025. She also won a Laureus Comeback of the Year award in 2024, for the comeback that would define the next stage of her career.

• 8. The Comeback Years

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  In late June 2023, Biles announced she would return to competition at the U.S. Classic, held on the 5th of August in the Chicago area. She posted an all-around score of 59.100, finishing five points ahead of runner-up Leanne Wong, and won both balance beam and floor exercise. At the U.S. National Championships that followed, Biles won her eighth national all-around title, breaking the record of seven held by Al Jochim since 1933. At 26 years and 166 days old, she also became the oldest woman ever to win the national all-around title, surpassing Linda Metheny Mulvihill's mark of 24 years and 100 days, set in 1971.

  At the 2023 World Championships, Biles qualified first in the all-around with a score of 58.932, nearly two points ahead of teammate Shilese Jones. In the all-around final, she won the world title with a score of 58.399, becoming the most successful gymnast in the combined history of the Olympics and Worlds, surpassing Vitaly Scherbo. She finished with a silver medal on vault, after a fall on the Yurchenko double pike, and a fifth-place finish on uneven bars. On balance beam she won gold, and on floor exercise she also won gold, becoming the first gymnast in World Championships history to win that many titles on one apparatus.

  Biles opened her 2024 season on the 18th of May at the Core Hydration Classic, winning her seventh career U.S. Classic all-around title. At the U.S. Gymnastics Championships, she won every event and became the first gymnast to claim nine national all-around titles, finishing 5.9 points ahead of Skye Blakely. At the Olympic trials, despite a fall from the balance beam, Biles won by more than five points over runner-up Sunisa Lee. She was selected to represent the United States at the 2024 Paris Olympics, alongside Jade Carey, Jordan Chiles, Lee, and Hezly Rivera.

  At the Paris Games, Biles helped the U.S. team win gold ahead of Italy in the team final. In the all-around final, she recovered from a mistake on uneven bars to win gold ahead of Rebeca Andrade and Sunisa Lee. She became the third woman ever to win two Olympic all-around titles, and the first to do so non-consecutively. In the vault final, she won gold, becoming the second woman after Věra Čáslavská to win two Olympic vault titles. On balance beam, she fell and finished fifth, the first time in nine Olympic or World beam finals that she left without a medal. On floor exercise, she finished 0.033 points behind Andrade for silver, ending a streak of ten consecutive international gold medals on that apparatus. After the event finals, Biles wore a medical boot for a calf injury she had aggravated during qualifications. At the closing ceremony, Biles took part in the ceremonial passing of the Olympic flag, marking the handoff from Paris to the 2028 Los Angeles Games.