US-Star Simone Biles breaks off the team competition in Tokyo. Now the “medical reason” is puzzled. The Russian gymnasts win team gold.
Cheers among the Russian gymnasts, fears about US superstar Simone Biles: The team of the Russian Olympic Committee is the team Olympic champion for the first time in 29 years and has also benefited from Biles’ retirement.
The Russian squad won the final in Tokyo on Tuesday with 169.528 points. Without the four-time Olympic champion Biles, who, according to the association, broke off the competition for “a medical reason” after the jump, the USA came in second with 166.096 points and thus missed their third Olympic victory in a row. Great Britain took third place with 164,096 points.
Russian gymnasts last won team gold with the Commonwealth of Independent States in Barcelona in 1992. The German gymnasts were only spectators in the final, which Elisabeth Seitz, Kim Bui (both Stuttgart), Sarah Voss (Cologne) and Pauline Schäfer (Chemnitz) had missed as ninth in the elimination with 161.162 points. Five years ago in Rio de Janeiro, the German squad took sixth place.
First the “R”, then the end for Simone Biles
But the focus was on Biles, who broke off her participation after the first device. The 24-year-old had previously received an unusually low rating of 13.766 points for her jump. She then left the hall with the American team doctor, to which she returned a short time later with a bandage on her right leg. From then on, she was listed with an “R” for reserve in the start lists, and the World Gymnastics Federation briefly confirmed the end of the team final.
On the second piece of equipment, the uneven bars, Biles replaced by Jordan Chiles listed as a substitute in the starting list. The exceptional gymnast should actually compete on all four machines. The US federation later announced that Biles had withdrawn “for a medical reason”. “It will be examined daily to determine medical clearance for future competitions,” it said. Further details were not given.
Already in the qualification last Sunday, Biles had not been able to meet the expectations placed in them. However, despite numerous blunders, she was the best of the four-way battle between floor, balance beam, jump and uneven bars.
On Monday, she complained about the enormous pressure on Instagram. “It wasn’t an easy day or my best, but I got through it. I truly feel like I have the burden of the world on my shoulders right now. I know I brush it off and make it look like the pressure isn’t affecting have on me but damn it is tough sometimes hahaha. Olympia is no joke, “she wrote.
Two hours before the team final, however, she posted a video clip on Instagram that showed her in a gymnastics dress in front of a mirror in the toilet.
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