The U.S. women's gymnastics team is well positioned to win the Olympic team gold medal, not just in terms of talent but also experience.
Four of the five women who will suit up this month were members of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic team. Featuring two all-around Olympic champions and four Olympic medalists, the Paris 2024 Olympic team is the most experienced and decorated in U.S. history.
The show stars Simone Biles, winner of 37 Olympic and World Championship medals. Her Olympic medal collection consists of two bronze, one silver and four gold medals, including the most coveted Olympic all-around gold medal in sports.
She is tied with Shannon Miller for the most Olympic medals by a U.S. gymnast and is likely to break that record in Paris as the reigning world champion in the individual all-around, balance beam, floor exercise and team event.
Biles will be joined in Paris by reigning Olympic all-around champion Suni Lee, Olympic silver medalist Jordan Chiles, Olympic gold medalist Jade Carey and freshman Hesley Rivera.
Biles called the upcoming Olympics a “revenge tour” for athletes returning from Tokyo.
“I feel like we all have the capacity to do better. Our performance in Tokyo was not our best,” Biles said Sunday at the Olympic Trials in Minneapolis. “We weren't at our best, but we feel like we have the burden on us to go out on the court and prove that we are better athletes.”
The U.S. team had to settle for silver in the team event in Tokyo after some unconventional mistakes: Chiles fell on floor exercise, Biles got lost in the air on vault and a twist forced her to withdraw from the competition.
“We've gotten more mature, we've gotten smarter, we've gotten more consistent,” Biles said this week.
Russian gymnasts are barred from Paris because of the ongoing war in Ukraine, and teams from Brazil and China are expected to be the U.S. women's biggest rivals in the team event.
Brazil's team is also rich in Olympic experience and medals, with Rebeca Andrade making her debut in Rio, just like Biles. Andrade won silver in artistic gymnastics and gold in vault in Tokyo, becoming the first Brazilian to win an Olympic medal in women's artistic gymnastics.
Brazil won its first world championship medal as a team last year and is aiming for its first Olympic team medal.
Besides Biles, the U.S. has a veteran lineup: Lee, the uneven bars star and Olympic bronze medalist, won three medals in Tokyo, one of each color, including a silver medal for helping the U.S. win the team final.
“I want to advance to the individual all-around final,” Lee said Sunday. “I want to finish in the top three in the balance beam final and win the gold medal on balance beam.”
“I always seem to get to the finals and always fail, and it's really frustrating,” she said with a laugh.
She will advance to the balance beam final in Tokyo and have a shot at winning an Olympic medal in the event, and her balance beam score of 14.600 at the Core Hydration Classic is one of the best scores in the world this year.
Carey, the reigning Olympic floor exercise champion, narrowly missed the podium on vault in Tokyo: She was in second place behind Biles going into the vault final but stumbled on the runway during the final, a fortuitous moment she credits with propelling her to return to the Olympics.
“A lot of us would say we want to make amends. We all have things that went wrong,” Carey said after making her second Olympic team.
Like other Tokyo Olympians, her experience was hampered by postponements and other COVID-19-related restrictions, and she is looking forward to a more immersive Olympic environment in Paris.
“Just having a normal experience, having my family there, meeting the other athletes, that's what I'm really looking forward to,” Carey said.
Despite his relative inexperience, Rivera expressed confidence in his teammates to guide him through the Olympic spotlight.
“They've been through it already. They've been through the journey, they've been to the Olympics, they've dealt with pressure,” Rivera, 16, said Sunday. “I think they'll be able to mentor me and help me a lot, not just during competitions, but throughout the whole training process.”
At 27, Biles will be the oldest American female gymnast to compete in the Olympics in 72 years.
All but one of the team members are in their 20s, a stark difference from past gold medal-winning U.S. Olympic gymnastics teams: This year's team is nearly six years older than the “Fierce Five” from the 2012 London Olympics, whose average age was 16.4.
Both that team and the 2008 Olympic team were made up of first-time Olympic competitors.
The 2016 Rio Olympic team had two returning Olympic skaters, Aly Raisman and Gabby Douglas, and in Tokyo, Biles was the only skater on the team with Olympic experience.
Raisman, who was 22 at the time of the Rio Olympics, was called “Grandma” by her teammates.
“I really have to apologize to Allie for calling her 'grandma' because I feel a lot older now,” Biles said. “I have to take my recovery a little more seriously. In Rio, I could do anything. … I was like a little hamster running on a wheel.”
Stream every moment and medal from the Paris 2024 Olympics on Peacock, starting with the Opening Ceremony on July 26 at 12pm ET..
