Simone Biles says she “should have quit way before Tokyo.”
The four-time Olympic gold medalist arrived in Tokyo with high expectations as she dealt with the sudden passing of a family member as well as preparing to testify at a Senate hearing regarding the sex abuse investigation of former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar.
Biles went viral after she was forced to withdraw from the women’s team final after developing ‘twisties,’ which is a mental block in gymnastics in which competitors lose track of their positioning mid-air. She would return to win bronze on the balance beam.
“If you looked at everything I’ve gone through for the past seven years, I should have never made another Olympic team,” Biles told New York magazine.
“I should have quit way before Tokyo, when Larry Nassar was in the media for two years. It was too much. But I was not going to let him take something I’ve worked for since I was six years old.
“I wasn’t going to let him take that joy away from me. So I pushed past that for as long as my mind and my body would let me.”
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Biles shed light on the twisties phenomenon that led her to immediately withdraw from the team and four individual finals.
“If I still had my air awareness, and I just was having a bad day, I would have continued. But it was more than that.
“Say up until you’re 30 years old, you have your complete eyesight. One morning, you wake up, you can’t see sh*t, but people tell you to go on and do your daily job as if you still have your eyesight,” Biles explained.
“You’d be lost, wouldn’t you? That’s the only thing I can relate it to. I have been doing gymnastics for 18 years. I woke up — lost it. How am I supposed to go on with my day?”
During her emotional testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the FBI’s handling of sexual abuse claims made against Nassar, the 24-year-old blamed “an entire system that enabled and perpetuated his abuse.”
