SIMONE BILES IS DOMINANT, IN HER MIND AND BODY, AND IS HALFWAY TO MAJESTY

The “twisties” never passed the French border, and after withdrawing from Tokyo, Biles was smooth and ignored calf issues while helping her U.S. teammates win Olympic gold in the gymnastics team event

     We are monitoring delicacy, the most decorated of gymnasts trying to avoid pain in her wrapped calf and whatever the world has learned about “twisties.” Simone Biles is watched by celebrities at Bercy Arena and many supporters in America. None of them understand what she has been through, because she still doesn’t know.

     If the objective was smoothness, she won Tuesday evening. Biles helped Team USA command gold in the women’s team final, her eighth Olympic medal, and her focus and ours becomes a grandiose performance in the all-around final. Three years ago at the Tokyo Games, she was debilitated by mental blockage. She was in the air but didn’t grasp why or how as she rotated.

     The twisties didn’t pass the French borders. She finished her floor exercise, where earlier she’d tweaked her left calf, and looked cooly into her hands. She breathed into them, with a zest. She got up and let her tongue fall into her lips as she smiled, waving at the audience that knows a masterful human triumph. Her teammates gathered with her in front of the American flag while people chanted “USA! USA!” Then they danced and looked ahead to Thursday night, where Biles tries to finish off a harrowing journey through her mind.

     The Redemption Tour, as she calls it, is halfway to a memorable celebration.

     “I started off with therapy this morning, so that was super exciting,” said Biles, referring to her therapist. “And then I told her I was feeling calm and ready, and that’s kind of exactly what happened.

     “I was like, “Yes, please no flashbacks or anything. But I did feel a lot of relief. And as soon as I landed I was like, ‘Oh, yeah, we’re going to do this.’ ’’

     Just the night before, when they should have been asleep, Biles and the Americans stayed up late and discussed what was coming. Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles and Biles — all spoke up. “I think there was a little bit of a struggle,” Biles said. “So it was really needed.” They didn’t want to be exceptions anymore. They wanted to rule.

     “We didn’t want to be put in the box,” she said.

     Scissors were applied. Biles moves ahead, without a rip, and said without a second thought, “We did what we were supposed to, and it just felt a little bit different. We had fun. We enjoyed each other’s time out here, and we just did our gymnastics.”

     Better than that, maybe. “She’s the greatest of all greats,” Chiles said.

     In sport, athletes are challenged by physical and emotional issues. Rarely have we seen a condition similar to hers, perhaps in golf with a driver or putter or in baseball with wild throws. Biles chose to withdraw during the team vault, in fright and fear, leaving a nation to ask aloud what haunted her. Haven’t other greats persevered? “If I could have run out of that stadium, I would have,” she said. She called her mother, Nellie, and said she was long gone. “Mom, I really can’t do this,” Simone said. “I’m lost, I cannot do this.” She returned two nights later on the balance beam and won a bronze.

     Could the funk happen again in Paris? “She knows something like that can happen because it did happen,” said her coach, Laurent Landi, before the Summer Games. “So it’s just, ‘OK, I’m going to be careful, I’m going to follow the same protocol every time and then I’m going to avoid (issues),’ and that’s all you can do.”

     “Afterward,” said Biles, “I kind of felt like I was in jail with my own brain and body.”

     The team event should lead to more glory, separating Biles from critics. In a Netflix podcast, “Simone Biles Rises,” she recalled those who called her a quitter. Assuming the critics were far away — “sitting on your couch and watching me from home” — she said, “I really don’t need your two cents. And not YOUR two cents because you guys can’t even do a cartwheel.”

     Rather, she continued to seek therapy and joined Olympic voices in mental health conversations. One was Michael Phelps, who was in the stands. Last year, she married an NFL safety, Jonathan Owens, who was allowed to attend the Summer Games this week by the Chicago Bears. In another media mixup, Owens once said he’s “the catch” in the romance, which prompted Simone to defend him to his blowbackers. At 27, she is more comfortable in her fame.

     Faith in her life has led to clarity.

     “I couldn’t run away from it, you know,” Biles told the Associated Press. “I owned it and said ‘Hey, this is what I’m going through. This is the help that I’m going to get.’ ”

     A tight wrap remained on her lower leg. Sunday, she said, “I’m going to need a wheelchair” and joked, “I’m going to do an easy layout.” Notice how her coaches won’t address the new problem. They are less than 48 hours away.

     For now, the Parisian heat wave is the headache. “Don’t come for me about my hair,” Biles wrote on Instagram. “IT WAS DONE but bus has NO AC and it’s like 9,000 degrees. Oh & a 45 minute ride.”

     She survived, it seems.

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     Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.