Simone’s mother, Nellie Biles, always knew where to find Simone whenever her daughter is missing. If 6-year-old Simone wasn’t performing back flips on their backyard, she probably might be playing on the trampoline with her two older brothers. There was even a moment that Simone ventured into their front yard – and believing that her parents wasn’t watching through their office window – she climbed the 4-foot mailbox and performed back tuck onto the grass below.
“Simone was a daring girl; she would do anything,” her mother, Nellie says. “If her brothers told her she couldn’t do something or challenged her, she would prove to them that she could.”
Twelve years later, Simone Biles -- now 18 years old -- still have a prosperous career as a professional gymnast. In August, she has once again emerged as the top U.S. gymnast after winning a third-consecutive national gymnastics title. Following that event, she had also won her third consecutive world gymnastics championship title, making her the first female gymnast to win three consecutive world titles.
However, despite all the success that has come across her way, the 4’8 ft teen gymnast is still far from the end of her journey. Next summer, Biles will fly to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she will compete at the 2016 Rio Olympics to win another all-around gymnastics title. Being able to do so would fulfill her childhood dream and would solidify her place as the most successful gymnast in the U.S. sports history.
When Simone Biles was young, she had an unexpected opportunity to show off her skills in public.
Due to a bad weather, Simone’s daycare cancelled their field trip to a farm, and they visited a local gymnastics gym instead. After watching the athletes perform gymnastics stunts, Simone fearlessly (and flawlessly) started to imitate the older athletes she had been watching.
The coaches that were watching was impressed with Simone’s ability, and just a week later, her gymnastics career officially began.
“At a very young age, Simone had endless energy from the time she woke up to when she would go to bed,” Nellie says. “She loved life, period.”
Biles have adapted quickly to the gym. At the beginning, Simone Biles had been training for 16 hours per week, and each year she progressively added hours to her training schedule. Even as her training has increased in difficulty, she has still maintained her lively and bubbly attitude, focusing on all of the positives that would arise from all of her hard work in the gym.
“At times the lifestyle was overwhelming,” Biles said. “But I knew that’s what I needed to do to get better and achieve my goals.”
Years later, the American artistic gymnast has improved and grew physically stronger. Soon enough, she was already performing some of the most difficult skills in gymnastics.
Biles’s skill level was pretty outstanding, already making a quite good impression on two gymnastics legends – Former Olympic all-around champion Mary Lou Retton and Former Olympian Shannon Miller. Retton said that Biles was “the most talented gymnast” she had ever witnessed, recognizing her as “unbeatable.”. Miller agreed and said, “Simone is the one everyone is trying to catch up with,”. “She takes these very intricate, demanding skills and makes them look so incredibly easy.”
“Simone is able to go seamlessly from the power event, like vault or floor,” Miller said. “And then stay on that four-inch wide beam and be completely steady.”
“The skills Simone is performing are mind-boggling,” says Miller. “Every four years, we think this is it. You can’t add another flip, you can’t add another twist, and then they do. Simone is spearheading that right now.”
