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Louise Thomas
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Simone Biles and MyKayla Skinner have appeared to interact with each other following the 2024 Women’s Final in Paris.
On Tuesday, July 28, Biles and her team took home the gold medal after she pulled out of most of the 2020 competitions because of a case of the “twisties.” When Biles first pulled herself out of the games, Skinner was the gymnast who took her place as the alternate on the team, and they went on to win a silver medal.
Following the Gymnastic US Olympic Team Trials in Minneapolis, Minnesota, earlier this month, Skinner posted a since-deleted video on YouTube, claiming that the 2024 current gymnasts don’t have the same “work ethic” as the ones who came before them.
“Besides Simone I feel like the talent and the depth isn’t what it used to be,” Skinner said at the time. “I just noticed, obviously, a lot of girls don’t work as hard. The girls don’t have the work ethic.”
Skinner also spoke about a shift in approach for how coaches treat gymnasts, adding: “Coaches can’t get on athletes which in some ways is really good but at the same time, to get to where you need to be in gymnastics you do have to be… a little aggressive, a little intense.”
After posting, clips from the video began to circulate on X, with Biles, her former teammate, writing on Instagram Threads at the time: “Not everyone needs a mic and a platform.” The mother of Jordan Chiles, another Team USA Olympian on the team, also commented regarding the video, writing on X: “Whoa. She really said that out loud and posted it. That’s something....”
The Olympic silver medalist then made an Instagram Story apologizing for what she said in the video, clarifying that it was based on her own personal experiences and she didn’t intend to offend the 2024 team.
“Just clearing up what had been said on my current video!” she wrote alongside her Story at the time.
“Hey, guys, just wanted to pop on here really quick, because I know we did the recap on YouTube,” Skinner started the apology video. “And I feel like a lot of you guys had misinterpreted or misunderstood exactly what I was meaning or had said.
“A lot of the stuff that I was talking about wasn’t always necessarily about the current team, because I love and support all the girls that made it and I’m so proud of them.”
“It was more about going back into my own gym and the work ethic is different compared to when we were doing gymnastics in the Marta [Karolyi, former US coach] era,” she added.
“Sorry for anything that got out of context or seemed hurtful,” she continued. “Throughout the video, I was so pumped for the girls and it was so fun watching trials and doing a live with everybody.”
“I love those girls and I’m seriously so happy for them” she concluded. “I would never do anything to make them feel otherwise. So, sorry if that came out wrong, that was not my intention at all.”
However, Skinner appeared to show her support for the team taking home the gold medal as she posted on her Instagram Story a photo of them all wearing their gold medals with a bunch of red heart emojis next to it.
Despite the apology and social media support, Biles posted about the team’s Olympic win on Instagram with a caption that appeared to nod toward Skinner’s deleted video. “Lack of talent, lazy, olympic champions,” Biles’ post read.
Many fans took to the comments afterward to acknowledge that they were aware of the apparent dig at Skinner’s comment. Even former artistic gymnast McKayla Maroney commented underneath the post to jokingly apologize for Skinner, who shares the same name as her.
“It doesn’t get more iconic than this... She f’d around n found out fr. Feels like I need to apologize just to redeem my first name,” her comment read.
Although Skinner did not publicly respond to this post, Biles posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Wednesday, July 31, “oops I’ve been blocked”. The post prompted many to speculate that the person who blocked her was Skinner.
The speculation appeared to be later confirmed by Chiles, who showed proof that Skinner blocked Biles by taking a picture of her teammate’s phone where she is unable to see any of Skinner’s posts. Chiles posted the photo on her Instagram Story, where she captioned it: “When she blocks Simone.”
