Sports Editorial, Oct 8 (EFE) – American gymnast Simone Biles continued to add to her legend after winning her 23rd gold medal in the World Championships, winning the balance beam and vault finals on Sunday in Antwerp, Belgium.
On Saturday, Biles left with a silver medal after being bested by Brazilian Rebeca Andrade in the floor final.
But on Sunday, the North American showed why she is unanimously considered the greatest gymnast of all time.
On the balance beam, where Biles already had the highest score in qualifying, she once again led the way with a brilliant routine.
The Ohio native, who had already won gold in Antwerp in both the individual and all-around competitions, finished first with a score of 14.800.
A tenth of a point more than Yaqin Zhou of China, who took silver with 14,700 points, and half a point more than the Brazilian Rebeca Andrade, who occupied the third step of the podium with 14,300 points.
A triumph that did not appease Biles, who less than an hour later climbed back to the top of the podium after winning the floor final with a score of 14.633.
Not even the small mistake made by the American on the third diagonal, where she lifted one foot off the mat, costing her a 0.100 penalty, prevented her from winning with a degree of difficulty that the rest of her rivals failed to match.
In fact, both Rebeca Andrade (Silver) and Flavia Saraiva (Bronze) had a better execution score in than the American, but the greater complexity of Biles’ elements, which started with a difficulty score of 6.700, relegated the two Brazilians to second and third place, respectively.
However, the gap seems to be narrowing, as evidenced by the 0.133 point difference between Andrade’s 14.500 and Saraiva’s 13.966 for the silver medal.
A demonstration of the constant progress of Brazilian gymnastics, but not enough to stop the cyclone Biles, who, returning after having withdrawn from the last Olympic Games in Tokyo to care for her mental health, confirmed her status as the undisputed “queen” of world gymnastics.
Hashimoto crowned “King” of Antwerp with third gold medal.
In the men’s category, the crown was won by Japan’s Daiki Hashimoto, who on Sunday won the gold medal in the uneven-bar final to add to his titles in the group and individual competitions.
Hashimoto, who had to settle for silver at the World Cups in Liverpool last year, won with 15.233 points ahead of Croatia’s Tin Srbic (silver, 14.700) and China’s Weide Su (bronze, 14.500).
The German Lukas Dauser also moved up on the podium, compared to the last World Championships in Liverpool, winning the parallel final with 15.400 points ahead of the Chinese Cong Shi, second with 15.066 points, and the Japanese Kaito Sugimoto, third with 15.000 points.
The British Jake Jarman was crowned the new vaulting world champion with a score of 15.050 in a final in which the American Khoi Young took the silver medal with a score of 14.849 and the Ukrainian Nazar Chepurnyi the bronze medal with a score of 14.766.EFE
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