Simone Biles is redefining brilliance in a sport that shamefully failed her
On Sunday night Simone Biles, on her way to securing her sixth US gymnastics title, performed a triple-double in her floor routine, one of two moves she executed during the contest that had never been accomplished before in women’s competition gymnastics. Have you seen it? You honestly have to see it, and then see it again in slow motion. I haven’t spoken to any physicists on the matter but, as someone who watched the move multiple times on my phone while eating a packet of crisps, I can assure you: she defied gravity.
Biles finished an astonishing 4.95 points ahead of her nearest competitor but remains markedly perfectionist, even in the hour of historic victory, reflecting: “It wasn’t as good as in some of the trainings.”
That she pulled off such feats at all has been hailed as “historic” for her sport; that she accomplished them amid the far-from-resolved fallout of the Larry Nassar sexual abuse scandal is somehow even more extraordinary and indicative of the vast extremes of light and shade that have characterised US gymnastics since gymnasts first reported concerns about the team doctor’s behaviour. Extremely belatedly these were acted on and Nassar is now serving life imprisonment. The story remains the biggest court-proven sexual abuse scandal in the history of sport.
“I think we’re very good at compartmentalising things,” Biles said at the time of Nassar’s sentencing, in January 2018. But even four days before her astonishing victory last weekend she had wept during a press conference at the competition when discussing the handling of the scandal by the governing body that, even now, she must reluctantly represent.
“I don’t mean to cry,” Biles told reporters. “But it’s hard coming here for an organisation having had them fail us so many times. And we had one goal and we’ve done everything that they’ve asked us for, even when we didn’t want to, and they couldn’t do one damn job. You had one job. You literally had one job and you couldn’t protect us.”
By way of a recap Nassar was accused of molesting more than 260 athletes under his care (he was also a doctor for Michigan State University). 144 of them testified at his trial, many of them making extraordinary impact statements face-to-face with him in the courtroom. “Little girls don’t stay little for ever,” one declared. “They grow into strong women that return to destroy your world.”
Some were unable to testify. Donna Markham spoke on behalf of her daughter Chelsea, who began seeing Nassar after picking up an injury at the age of 10. The abuse that followed precipitated a spiral of despair that ended with Chelsea taking her own life when she was 23.
The most widely publicised testimony came from Biles’s former teammate Aly Raisman, who stared down Nassar in the courtroom and declared: “Over those 30 years when survivors came forward, adult after adult – many in positions of authority – protected you, telling each survivor it was OK, that you weren’t abusing them. In fact, many adults had you convince the survivors that they were being dramatic or had been mistaken. This is like being violated all over again.” She declined to speak optimistically about the future. “It’s clear now,” she stated, “that, if we leave it up to these organisations, history is likely to repeat itself.”
And yet, to most intents and purposes, the task of rebuilding for the athletes has been left up to those institutions. Despite attempts to take the moral high ground the US Olympic Committee is deeply compromised on the Nassar scandal, with a congressional report a fortnight ago including it in a series of institutions that failed to protect child and young adult athletes from Nassar in a way that was “a coverup in spirit … whether it was a criminal cover-up remains to be proven”.
It is difficult to escape the obvious conclusion: that USA Gymnastics, which failed Biles and so many others so spectacularly, should not really still be standing. Last year the USOC began a push to decertify the body. Yet here we still are, with the expectation, certainly on the part of USAG, that its death sentence will be reprieved. While Michigan State has so far paid out $500m in compensation, none of Nassar’s victims has yet been compensated by USAG. Allegedly to expedite this, USAG has begun bankruptcy proceedings – but these have had the (intended?) effect of staying the executioner’s hand. It cannot be decertified until bankruptcy
proceedings have been concluded. At this rate USA Gymnastics will still be running the show for the Tokyo Olympics next year, and perhaps for good.
The congressional committee who wrote the report are outraged that declaring bankruptcy could buy USAG almost indefinite time. As one senator puts it: “Bankruptcy proceedings should not impede real accountability for bankrupt morals and leadership. American gymnasts deserve so much more than the inept and ineffective USAG.”
But will they get it? For all the leadership churn at USAG – they are currently on their fourth president since allegations surfaced – many senior officials remain in post.
In a particular irony, another part of the reason USAG enjoys success is because of Biles, the only gymnast who disclosed abuse by Nassar to be still competing. Double the crowds turned out for the women’s competition than graced the men’s event – record crowds – and they come in large part to see the historically sensational Biles at work. If only she could be permitted to have just one job – instead of both striving to win and having to push for justice against all the adults who did not do theirs.