Simone Biles dominates vault, wins 3rd gold medal in Paris
(NEXSTAR) — American Simone Biles continued her magical run at the Paris Games winning her 3rd gold medal in the last week. With the Saturday victory in vault, Biles wins the seventh Olympic gold medal of her career, and 10th overall.
She scored an average of 15.300 for her two vaults, a rotation that included her signature Yurchenko double pike, which is the hardest being done in competition by any female gymnast. The competiton averages a competitor’s two best vaults of three attemps.
Jade Carey of Team USA won the bronze medal.
This has been an amazing week for Biles, who went into Saturday’s vault competition with gold medals in the women’s team final and the all-around and drew a star-studded crowd every time she competed. She has more gold medals than any other American gymnast.
Biles still has two more events, too. She has the balance beam and floor exercise on Monday.
Three years after she pulled out of most of her events at the Tokyo Olympics to address her mental health, Biles has bounced back to become only the third woman to become a two-time all-around champion. She joined Larisa Latynina of the Soviet Union in 1956 and 1960 and Vera Caslavska of Czechoslovakia in 1964 and 1968.
And at 27, she’s the oldest to finish atop the all-around podium since then 30-year-old Maria Gorokhovskaya of the Soviet Union won the first-ever Olympic all-around in Helsinki in 1952.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.