Simone Biles Wins Seventh National Women's All-Around Title
Four-time Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles earned her seventh national women's all-around title for gymnastics over the weekend, securing her the most titles of any American woman gymnast.
The United States Gymnastics Championships concluded on Sunday in Fort Worth, Texas, where Biles took home the top prize with a score of 119.650 points, ahead of runner-up Sunisa Lee with 114.950 points and fellow teammate and third-place winner Jordan Chiles with 114.450 points. She won three of the four events in the competition, with a comfortable winning margin of 4.7 points.
"We came out here, and we did what we were supposed to," Biles said.
Biles has dominated the world of gymnastics for eight years, winning every all-around competition she's entered since 2013. Her easy win this past weekend was in large part thanks to her four dazzling routines, one of which included a historical move known as the Yurchenko double pike that prior female gymnasts have had yet to attempt in competition.
Debuted by Biles at the GK U.S. Classic preceding nationals last month, the move involves two straight-legged backflips in the air launched by a roundoff back handspring, requiring perilous amounts of momentum, speed, and strength. Well-aware of the ambitious vault move she had then just pulled off, she took to Twitter to share her excitement over completing the unprecedented feat. As she should.
The champion gymnast has previously performed other moves that went down in history, with four elements officially taking after her name in the Women's Artistic Gymnastics Code of Points: one for vault, one for balance beam, and two for floor exercises. Following this competition, the Yurchenko double pike saw speculation over its own place on this Biles-dedicated list, in addition to its difficulty score of 6.6, which some deemed too low given the move's arguable difficulty level relative to other so-called standard competing stunts.
Her win from the weekend officially qualifies her for July's Tokyo Olympics, where she is set to compete as part of the USA Women's Gymnastics Team. "It's really emotional, especially going into my second time doing an Olympic run. It's really crazy," Biles said.
"I feel like I did try to enjoy it, because it could be one of my last championships that I'll attend," she also shared. "But it's also the road to Tokyo, and after this we have trials, so we just have to really embrace the moment."
Sabrina Park is a Digital Fellow at HarpersBAZAAR.com where she covers news, fashion, and culture stories. When she’s not writing she loves hanging out with her cat, reading outdoors and scrolling the depths of TikTok.
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