[Simone Biles has withdrawn from the individual competition]

45 minutes ago, Amy in NH said:

A case of "The Twisties"?

Copied from FB:

Hannah Renno

The US women won a silver medal in gymnastics in Tokyo today. By many standards and opinions, this will be considered a "failure." I would like to share my perspective on why this is a massive victory.

 

Many have heard the media reports that began emerging exactly five years ago, while the women were competing in Rio. Since then, the depth and breadth and staggering quantity and severity of the abuse--sexual, physical, psychological, emotional--has been exposed. Some of it has been punished. Much of it has not yet been. But "the system" that allowed this, perpetuated this, and directly caused this needed to change.

 

The system has changed. Some. A new national team coordinator was named, and he has tried to foster openness and mutual respect. I had a lot of hope for his tenure, and the majority of national team gymnasts would testify that the culture is improved. Progress!

 

But, without losing my non-gymnastics audience in details and nuance, his leadership skills have been severely lacking. He has not adequately outlined the selection criteria for Olympic or World Championship qualification. When asked to identify his strategy beforehand, he said one thing, and literally did another. When asked by media why he made this change, his answers were dismissive and uncompelling, and his tone was disrespectful. In short, his strategy was, "Well we don't really need to worry about it, because we have Simone."

 

Imagine being 24 years old and being labelled as the greatest of all time. Admittedly, she has endorsed that branding with Goldie the rhinestone Goat on her leotards, but frankly, it's justified. Imagine breaking record after record at Olympics and World Championships and US Championships, and literally re-writing the Code of Points (she has four skills named after her already, and will have a fifth if she decides to compete her already-famous Yurchenko Double Pike). Imagine being the face of NBC for months leading up to the Olympics.

 

It's all an honor. It's all deserved. It all comes with lucrative endorsement deals.

 

And it's all A LOT of pressure.

 

Does the common man know how badly gymnastics hurts? Or do they make it look deceptively easy so you don't think about their pain?

 

So if we treat this as a math equation, so far we are adding together:

- Surviving sexual abuse by the doctor that your sports federation hired, plus

- Competing for an organization (USA Gymnastics) that has lied and withheld and destroyed documents that would be incriminating in these cases, and still in a legal gridlock with a massive lawsuit and bankruptcy, plus

- Giving repeated interviews that say a primary reason you are still competing is to hold the governing body accountable for its abusive actions, plus

- Being "led" by a leader whose whole strategy is "Don't worry, nobody can beat us when we have Simone," plus

- Being led by a leader whose wife can't refrain from being a keyboard warrior whining about all the (justified) criticism of her husband on the very eve of this epic meet today (don't look, it's sickening), plus

- Pressure amplified by media outlets and social media, plus

- Real physical pain, plus

- Real physical exhaustion, plus

- Real physical DANGER (I can't describe to you how complex, impressive, and downright dangerous these skills are that she is competing), plus

- Her own self-imposed goals and pressure, equals...

 

A very stressful life indeed. Under the Olympic microscope. With three of your best friends by your side, really hoping you can all hack it and earn the gold medal that is expected, and is even being treated as a foregone conclusion.

 

I read a quote from earlier this year that Simone couldn't wait until the Tokyo Olympics. Not for them to start; she couldn't wait for them to be over. What a mindset to be handling all this multifaceted pressure under.

 

My guess--and admittedly, this is purely speculation based on what I saw and what she said in interviews afterward--is that she lost air awareness in her vaults. Some people call it "The Twisties." It's like an inner ear equilibrium problem when you are flinging flipping flying twisting through the air at 100 mph. If you don't know where you are in your twist, then you have no idea when/how you will hit the ground. If you don't know how to prepare for the landing, it can hurt you. Very badly. Usually it stems from stress and lack of confidence in a skill. But once it happens once, it is very difficult to just "go back to normal." Sometimes it takes weeks. Or months.

 

My old teammates will remember this story, I'm sure. On December 1, 1998, I was training whip-two-and-a-halfs on floor. I was almost 15, and I had already competed 2.5's for a year, but the whip into it was new. I remember struggling with it, and I remember being frustrated and scared. I remember that I had done nine of them, because normally we stopped after about five repetitions of each tumbling pass. I couldn't wait to be done with them.

 

The next thing I remember, my coach was spoon-feeding me jello.

 

It took me quite a while to orient myself, but I finally concluded that I was in a hospital. My hands were tied to my bed. An IV was running. Monitors were beeping. And my coach was feeding me by spoon.

 

I remembered going to gymnastics the night before (was it the night before?). I thought through the rotations I had done, remembered tumbling, and thought, something must have happened on floor. I didn't have the energy or clarity to ask for more information.

I remember very little of the next few days. Final exams were the following week, so I asked for my parents to bring my textbooks so I could study. When I opened my Biology book, the words were literally swimming on the page, and it felt like someone stuck a knife in my skull. I closed the book, and went back to sleep.

 

I was discharged from the ICU after three days, when my brain swelling had subsided. I slept for most of the next week. I had colossal headaches and crushing fatigue. Somehow, I completed my exams, and two weeks later, I was cleared to go back to the gym for conditioning.

Long story short, I underestimated how painful that would be, and while I ended up having a very successful season, it was MONTHS to regain my confidence on twisting skills. I simply didn't trust my body to know where it was in the air. (On that fateful day, instead of 1 flip and 2.5 twists to my feet, I had done 1.25 flips and 2 twists flat to my back, completely missing my feet on the floor.)

 

Simone looked lost in the air. The same thing had happened in her last warmup vault before competing, which she had crashed into the ground. Instead of 1 flip and 2.5 twists to the left, you can see that by the end of the first twist, her head is at neutral, and in the last half of the twist (she did 1.5 total), her head is toward the right. Your head should never be to the right if you are twisting left. She was completely disoriented.

 

Miraculously, she landed on her feet in a deep squat, and touched neither her hands nor butt to the ground. She saluted, walked off, and looked stunned.

 

I've already seen several armchair gymnasts today calling her cowardly. That she's not mentally tough enough to handle the pressure. That she caved. That she gave up. That she wasn't willing to risk/sacrifice for her team. That she failed.

 

I'll tell you one excellent thing about the new gymnastics regime in the United States. Simone said she was not safe to compete. And they listened. And they supported her.

 

They did not shuffle her off the floor to hide her. They did not pressure her to continue. They did not relegate her to permanent banishment and judgment. They listened.

 

Who knows what would have happened if Simone competed the rest of the meet today. She says she was not at all confident that she could complete her routines safely. I think most people think, like, maybe her ankles are in jeopardy. Or she's just trying to avoid the embarrassment of a fall. Or the embarrassment of not winning a gold medal.

 

I hope my example provides insight that losing air awareness is literally life threatening. Her brain and spinal cord are genuinely at risk. Nevermind an Olympic medal.

 

So in my eyes, today was a victory. Simone had the privilege of thinking, feeling, and deciding. Her teammates had the privilege of rising to the occasion on the biggest of stages, under the brightest of lights. Jordan Chiles, who was not slated to compete on bars or beam today, stepped in and NAILED IT when it mattered. Grace McCallum has now hit eight for eight routines in the Olympics, with a silver medal to show for her courage and consistency. Sunisa Lee crushed the world's hardest (literally) bar routine when the pressure was massive. And she excelled on floor as the last American competing, when their "defeat" was already almost certain.

 

I hope people take advantage of the privilege of watching this 24-year-old's life unfold on their TV screens. She's tremendous when she soars, and she's tremendous when she speaks. Every day until today, she's showed us that she *can.* Today, she told us that she can't, and I respect her all the more.

 

It remains to be seen whether she will compete in her remaining FIVE events this Olympics. She's due up for the all-around competition in two days, and for all four event finals in the days after that. She is allowed to compete, and she is allowed to withdraw. Or she can choose some of each.

 

I hope she feels respected, empowered, admired, and love. I hope she feels confident in her gymnastics and in her decision-making. I hope she leaves here with heaps of perspective and no regrets. And I hope she forever cherishes what that silver medal today means for her, her teammates, the gymnastics community, and anybody who has EVER felt that the external pressure to "carry on" is too great to survive.

 

GO TEAM USA! Olympic Silver Medalists!!!!

Thank you for this explanation. I strongly believe that Simone does NOT owe us a reason or an explanation, but this gives me an understanding that I did not have. I am so glad that she had the self awareness to pull out. I’m so glad she did not end up with a severe injury.

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