Simone Biles stumbled again at the Olympics: she said goodbye with a silver after a brilliant performance by Rebeca Andrade

The American Simone Biles He said goodbye this Monday to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games adding a new silver medal to her list of achievements, but without managing to equal the Soviet record Larisa Latynina as the most decorated gymnast in history.

A small fall on the balance beam and the power of the Brazilian Rebecca Andrade, who won gold on the floor ahead of Bilesthey robbed him of the two golds he needed, in front of a devoted crowd in the French capital.

In Paris-2024, the most equal Games in Olympic history, only the American swimmer Katie Ledecky Biles will have equalled Latynina’s nine golds and her record as the woman with the most titles at the Games. But Biles is not leaving empty-handed. In addition to the four golds from Rio 20216, she has three more from Paris 2024, as well as the silver on the floor, and the feeling of having overcome the tragedies of Tokyo 2020, when she dropped out.

Rebeca Andrade shined over Biles

The Brazilian Rebecca Andrade She won gold on the floor in gymnastics Paris 2024 performing a Simone-style feat Biles. With her impeccable floor exercise, Andrade She has won her fourth medal at these Games – after a bronze and two silvers – and her sixth Olympic podium in total, making her the most medallist in her country.

The podium of the last artistic gymnastics event in Paris-2024 The American closed it Jordan Chilesbronze. Andrade’s second Olympic gold, following on from her triumph in the vault three years ago in Tokyo, sent the excited green-yellow fans into a frenzy, after a week of waiting to finally sing their anthem at the Arena Bercy.

Andradea historic gymnast for her country, climbed onto the podium with her compatriots chanting her name and received by the reverence of Chilies and Bileswho has always pointed to the Brazilian as his most feared rival.

The most decorated gymnast in history, who in Paris raised her tally of Olympic golds to seven, had her worst day at these Games on Monday, and was unable to overcome her fall during the balance beam exercise.

Her fifth place in this highly precise apparatus already buried the possibility that the winner of 23 world titles would leave Paris equal to the Soviet legend Larissa Latynina and the American swimmer Katie Ledecky as the women with the most gold medals in a Games.

The serious expression with which Biles finished the event had not disappeared when she returned to warm up on the floor, one of her favorite disciplines, where she even made a bad landing during rehearsals.

Once on the floor, the American once again took flight with her spectacular acrobatics, but she went off the mark when landing two diagonals, which would end up leaving her behind the spectacular exercise with which Andrade had set the gold threshold at 14.166.

The judges ultimately awarded Biles a 14.133, which earned her a silver medal, making her eleventh Olympic medal in total.

SPORTS

With AFP.