“We did this to ourselves,” Jordan Chiles said. “But we also did it for her.”
no congratulations is yours Biles replied to move forward without me. “They are silver medalists,” he told them. “It’s something they should be proud of because they did it without me.”
Russia finished with a total score of 169,528 points, a difference of over 3 points with the United States winning the silver medal with a total of 166.096 points. The bronze medal was won by the United Kingdom with a score of 164,096. With this victory, Russia ended the overwhelming dominance of gymnastics that the US team had held for more than a decade.
And in Sunday’s qualifiers, Russia surprised the Americans, adding to the pressure on the American team to maintain its undisputed success in the sport.
The last time the United States lost a team final at an Olympics or world championship was in 2010, to Russia. Since then, the United States in the sport has outpaced the rest of the world, winning World Championships and Olympics by fairly large margins.
In Tokyo, Team USA did what they could to preserve its successful legacy. But without Bells, the Americans could not keep up with the Russians. However, in the last event, the floor exercise, they seemed to have a chance of winning the gold, and were only eight tenths behind first place. The unexpected fall of Chili’s, who fell in one of his moves poorly, gave him a total of only 11.7 points, which solidified the Russians in the lead.
A day after the Russian men’s team won the gold, the women executed their complex routines with precision and grace, while the Americans did their best to regroup. Nor did the confidence of the Americans who reached the final try to bounce back from second place to Russia in qualifying.
During qualifying Sunday, Biles and some of her teammates made unusual mistakes because they were nervous. After landing off the balance beam, Biles took a big step and went back several small steps. In the floor exercise, he went so far as to slip off the edge of the platform. On the colt, he fell off the carpet.
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