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| Picture by 2024 Getty Images |
Simone Biles was golden once again at the Olympic Games Paris 2024, winning the women's vault final Saturday (3 August).
The gymnastics superstar averaged a 15.300 for gold. Tokyo 2020 champion Rebeca Andrade won the silver at 14.966, followed by American Jade Carey (14.466).
For Biles, it's a third gold in Paris, and overall her seventh Olympic title and 10th medal at the Games. She was previously Olympic champion on vault at Rio 2016.
When the American warmed up her signature Yurchenko double pike, the daring vault that bears her name, Biles rolled straight to her back.
Throughout the 2024 season she's talked about how she can overpower the vault, so as she stood at the end of the runway readying herself coach Laurent Landi wanted to her remain patient and calm.
"Laurent was signaling like, calm down, take your time. Just so that I don't overpower it because, obviously, once you get up there, your adrenaline is pumping," explained Biles. "So he wanted to make sure that I was staying calm and going on my own time, even though the [scoreboard] said, 'Go' and everybody started cheering, he's just like, 'Calm down. Wait. You're good.'"
Better than good. She was great.
"I kinda nailed that one," Biles said, beaming.
The vault, which carries with it a massive 6.4 difficulty score, .8 more than any other vault in the final, scored 15.700. Biles, then, soared her on her Cheng vault, earning a 14.900.