CNN
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Simone Biles put on a show at the Paris Olympics and walked away with another three gold medals and a silver to add to her extraordinary collection.
But the road to get to Paris wasn’t easy.
At Tokyo 2020, Biles suddenly started suffering from the “twisties,” a mysterious phenomenon that suddenly means a gymnast is no longer able to do a twisting skill they’ve done thousands of times before.
Biles told CNN Sport’s Coy Wire that her return to the Olympics was for no one else, and that past experience made her participation and performances in Paris all the sweeter.
“It was important to me because nobody forced me to be out there on that stage. I solely did it for myself and I’m in a really good spot mentally and physically. So doing this for just me meant the world.”
Despite overcoming them, she admits that doubts sometimes still begin to creep in.
“I dealt with them in therapy. Obviously, you always have those thoughts coming into the back of your head, but just trying to stay as positive as possible, going back to what I know, thinking about my therapy tactics – and it worked.”
To make her silver medal performance on the floor exercise on Monday even more impressive, Biles arrived to the interview wearing a protective boot on her left foot.
The 27-year-old had to have her leg taped for her performance after suffering a fall in the warmup. She had been dealing with pain in her left calf ahead of the Paris Olympics and aggravated the injury during qualifying round on the second day of the Olympics, again in a warmup for the floor exercise.
It didn’t slow her down much as she won gold with Team USA in the team competition and then took the individual all-around and vault gold medals. She finished her Olympics with the silver on the floor and a fifth place finish in the individual balance beam competition.
After the floor final, Biles and her teammate, bronze medalist Jordan Chiles, created an instantly viral image by bowing in honor on either side of gold medalist Rebeca Andrade of Brazil.
It quickly became one of the enduring images of these Olympic Games. It was a display of sportsmanship and humility, and encapsulated what it means for athletes to have the Olympic spirit.
Without doubt, it will go down as one of the most iconic Olympic moments.
“I think it was really important for that moment,” Biles told CNN’s Wire. “Obviously, it was just me and Jordan being me and Jordan, but I know it was really special and it was very impactful for kids to see that. You win with grace, you lose with grace.”
This is a developing story and will be updated.
