Team USA won gold in the women’s gymnastics team final at the Paris Olympics on Tuesday, July 30, marking a dramatic return to form for superstar Simone Biles, who helped lead her team to victory after withdrawing mid-competition from the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.
Biles, Jade Carey, Jordan Chiles, Sunisa Lee and Hezly Rivera bested Italy and Brazil, who placed second and third respectively, with a final score of 171.296, 5.802 above the silver medal finishers.
This marks the fifth gold medal for Biles, 27, the second for Lee and Carey and the first for Chiles and Rivera, the latter of whom did not participate in any apparatuses on Tuesday. Team USA previously won silver in the event at the Tokyo and Beijing Games, and gold in Rio and London.
Chiles, 23, Carey, 24, and Biles started things off strong on the vault, where they all scored above a 14 (Biles, who won gold in the same competition in Rio in 2016, scored the highest, with 14.900).
Then on the uneven bars, Chiles, Biles and Lee, 21, kept the momentum up, with all scoring above a 14 once more. Lee led her team on balance beam with 14.600, and on the floor routine, Lee scored a 13.533, Chiles a 13.966 and Biles a 14.666.
“It was amazing to watch,” U.S. gymnastics technical lead Chellsie Memmel told reporters, including PEOPLE, after competition ended. “I know I was nervous throughout the whole competition, but they do their job.”
