Family anguish behind Biles' Olympic struggles

Simone Biles captured the attention of sporting fans around the world during her rollercoaster Tokyo Olympics campaign.

The superstar gymnast withdrew from the team event for Team USA, as well as all but one of her individual events, because she was struggling with the “twisties”.

If you aren’t familiar with the twisties, feel free to check out the handy explainer we wrote last week. But here’s the short version.

Gymnasts usually know exactly where they are while they’re flipping and twisting through the air. When the twisties strike, they lose that spatial awareness. Suddenly they have no idea where they are or, crucially, where they’ll land.

The twisties can hit at any time, for no apparent reason, and they can affect anyone. Even the greatest gymnast of all time, Simone Biles.

After being evaluated by the US Team’s training staff, Biles miraculously returned to Olympic competition for the individual beam event, winning a bronze medal in the final.

“I’m pretty happy. I wasn’t expecting to medal, I just came out here and tried to do a good beam set,” Biles said.

Stream The Simone Biles story: Courage to Soar on BINGE. New customers get a 14-day free trial and start streaming instantly. Sign up at binge.com.au
 

“Just to have one more opportunity to compete at the Olympics meant the world to me.”

She told NBC she was “very shocked” to have won a medal on the beam.

“This means more than all of the golds, because I have pushed through so much the last five years, and the last week while I’ve been here,” said Biles.

“It was very emotional, and I’m just proud of myself and just all of these girls as well.”

She stood by her decision to withdraw from the team final, in which the US wound up winning silver.

“My mental and physical health is better than any medal,” she said.

“At the end of the day, we’re not just entertainment, we’re humans. And there are things behind the scenes that we’re also trying to juggle, as well as sport.

Making the achievement even more remarkable was the revelation Biles’ aunt “unexpectedly” died while she was in Tokyo.

Biles rocketed into the public consciousness at the 2016 Rio Olympics, where she was a breakout star, winning four gold medals.
 

But her road to success has been far from a smooth one.

And thanks to a movie about her early life and rocky progression to superstardom now available on streaming service Binge, fans can learn more about Biles’ backstory.

The Simone Biles story: Courage to Soar is based on the gymnast’s best-selling 2017 autobiography and follows Biles’ tricky upbringing.

Her mother was unable to care for Biles or her other children and all four spent time in and out of foster care.

At a very young age, Simone and her younger sister were adopted by their grandfather Ron and his second wife Nellie, while her two older siblings were adopted by Ron’s sister.

Identified as a prodigious talent from the first time she set foot in a gymnasium, the film shows the countless sacrifices Biles made as well as the obstacles she had to overcome to reach the top of the gymnastics world.

Biles and her parents decided to switch from regular schooling to home school in her mid-teens, so she could increase her training hours in the gym significantly.
 

Then once she had completed her secondary education already with countless world championship gold medals under her belt, Biles made the agonising decision to pass up a gymnastics scholarship to UCLA and forfeit her NCAA eligibility so she could turn professional.

The biopic also reveals legendary Team USA coach Márta Károlyi wasn’t overly impressed when she first laid eyes on Biles, telling her she had a lot of work to do.

With her turbulent path to gymnastics glory in mind, Biles’ achievements and ability to return to competition in Tokyo are all the more remarkable.

Stream The Simone Biles story: Courage to Soar on BINGE. New customers get a 14-day free trial and start streaming instantly. Sign up at binge.com.au