The power of Simone Biles
The four-time Olympic champion has transcended her sport and raised awareness
TOKYO >> The day after Valorie Kondos Field’s first chemotherapy treatment for breast cancer, the UCLA gymnastics coach was visiting with a 15-year-old recruit from Texas named Simone Biles.
Kondos Field, known to all as Miss Val, warned Biles before the recruiting trip that she might be worn out from treatment when the gymnast arrived in Westwood. But here was Kondos Field, going full speed ahead with her sales pitch, when Biles reached across and placed her hand on the coach’s arm.
“Miss Val, I hate to interrupt you, but how are you feeling?” Kondos Field recalled Biles asking her, the poignancy of the moment still clear in the coach’s voice close to a decade later.
This is what Biles does. She touches us, takes our breath away with bold, gravity-defying feats, and small gestures; with a power both simple and spectacular.
“Simone’s legacy for everyone is that you can now believe in breaking through those glass ceilings.” — Kondos Field
These Olympic Games are the Simone Biles Show. Everyone else, world record-setting runners and swimmers, NBA superstars, Grand Slam and Majors winners, compelling underdogs from nations you couldn’t find on a map, are all just supporting cast. Beginning with Sunday’s women’s team preliminary round, the next two weeks are a celebration of a once-in-a-lifetime athlete who soared to unprecedented heights. And once she had our attention, f6orced us to take a hard look at the reality back on the ground.
“Simone’s legacy for everyone is that you can now believe in breaking through those glass ceilings,” Kondos Field said. “That as long as you prepare physically and emotionally, you visualize it, you work hard and surround yourself with people who will help you visualize it, you can bring that vision to life. You can truly break barriers. Simone’s proven that to us. She’s proven it to the world.”
Biles is expected to lead the U.S. to a third consecutive Olympic team gold in Tokyo and is an overwhelming favorite to become the first woman to successfully defend the individual all-around title in more than 50 years, further solidifying her place as the greatest athlete in the sport’s history.