First Rio gold is within reach for USA gymnastics

The only reason she doesn’t have a ton of Olympic gold medals is that this is the first year she’s been old enough to compete on the Olympic team.

On Sunday, Team USA dominated team qualification.

“They were not only physically prepared, but mentally prepared, and that’s a nice place to be because you don’t have to snap anybody into place”, US Olympic coach Aimee Boorman said, according to the USA Gymnastics website. Biles is the gold-medal favorite in five of six events.

Russian Federation won silver with a combined score of 176.688 and China won bronze with a score of 176.003.

Simone Biles, Aly Raisman, and Laurie Hernandez competed on the vault first.

And just like that, the young women in the glittery red-and-blue leotards national team coordinator Karolyi has molded into a global force relaxed. There’s a reason why she’s three-time world champion. Simone Biles, who has been called the best gymnast ever, placed first.

Here’s how it all started: Just after she finished her race, US swimmer Lilly King wagged her finger at Russia’s Yulia Efimova (who had been suspended for 16 months for doping, and was controversially allowed to compete in the Games), which as The New York Times reported, was to remind everyone who was No. 1.

Aly Raisman, the captain of the US women’s gymnastics team, will once again compete in the individual all-around final after narrowly missing out on a medal in the event in London. Both were members of the “Fierce Five” gold-medal winning team from the 2012 London Games.

However, while the top eight qualify for the individual all-around final, which is Thursday, only two are eligible from each country for that competition.

Gabby Douglas is the Olympic gymnastics reigning all-around champion, but not for long. Even beyond her unparalleled skills, Biles has a true passion for her sport and it shines through whenever she competes, as she always appears to be really enjoying herself. She will, however, be competing in the finals for uneven bars.

In a separate interview, as was reported by USA Today, Lilly said: “Basically, what happened this morning was that I finished and then I waved my finger a little bit, because that’s kind of how I am”.

“I would have loved to go out there and defend my title, but right now I’m just rejoicing and so far this has just been an fantastic experience”, she told the AP.

“I think everyone out there, we all performed how we trained, and that’s all very special – something we have to keep for team finals and any event finals that we qualified for”, Biles said. She scored a 16.233 on vault (which is phenomenal, just so you know) in the team finals, but fell during her vault during the event finals. And while those scores will be scrapped during the finals, Team USA will certainly look to meet or top its performance.