Simone Biles fights through calf injury to produce impressive performance on Olympic return
By Kyle Feldscher and Issy Ronald, CNN
Paris (CNN) — Simone Biles fought through pain in her calf on Sunday to post an impressive all-around score and display the qualities which have made one of the greatest gymnasts of all time on her return to the Olympics.
After she produced a flawless balance beam routine which scored 14.733 – the highest on the apparatus – Biles landed awkwardly while warming up for her floor routine and exited the arena before reemerging to get her lower left leg heavily taped.
Cecile Landi, her coach, told reporters after the competition that Biles had been dealing with calf pain a couple weeks before Paris that flared up again during Sunday’s competition.
“She felt a little something in her calf. But yeah, that’s all,” Landi told reporters.
She appeared in pain, walking with a heavy limp, but still managed to twist through the air with her usual force on every other apparatus, scoring an impressive 15.800 on the vault, 14.433 on the uneven bars and 14.600 on the floor.
Overall, she registered an all-around score of 59.566, the highest total as of yet and more than three points ahead of her teammate Suni Lee, though she and the USA team won’t have a confirmed spot in the finals until later on Sunday once every country has completed its qualifying round.
When asked by reporters if she was OK following competition on Sunday, Biles sad, “Yup! As good as I can be.” She didn’t stick around to talk further and Landi said there are currently no concerns about her ability to compete throughout the Olympics.
Biles has endured a long and much documented road back to the Olympics, the competition where she experienced a mental block known as “the twisties” that forced her to withdraw from multiple events, including the women’s team final, three years ago in Tokyo.
Biles kept moving throughout much of Sunday’s qualifying, rarely taking time to sit unless she was getting training, in an attempt to keep her calf loose. While she was obviously in discomfort through the day’s final three rotations, she hardly slowed down and moved with the explosiveness that is her trademark.
Once she completed all her routines, joy seemed to radiate from Biles as she grinned, waved to the crowd and danced in celebration with her teammates.
She ended the second subdivision of the day leading in the all-around competition and having the top scores on the vault and floor routine – both of which came after her apparent injury – and the second-best score on the balance beam.
“Simone was great. She was outstanding,” said Chellsie Memmel, the technical gymnastics lead for USA Gymnastics, to reporters following the competition. “That’s how she trains. I mean, she comes out and she comes into the gym and she does her job. She did that at podium (training). She just did it again here. So she’s fun to watch.”
Memmel told reporters that she couldn’t publicly repeat the thoughts that went through her head after Biles appeared in pain, but was impressed by the star’s gritty performance.
“She is an outstanding gymnast and person – just, like, overall human – so what she was able to do with looking like she you know, had some soreness or something in her lower leg. It is remarkable,” Memmel said.
Gymnastics qualifying continues throughout the day on Sunday, so it won’t be until the evening in Paris for it to be clear who will go through to the medal competition on Tuesday.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.
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