Celebrity
All The Records Simone Biles Set At The 2023 World Championships
The GOAT had a historic week.
The greatest ever is officially even greater. After a two-year hiatus, Simone Biles stepped back onto the international stage to compete at the 2023 Artistic Gymnastics World Championships in Antwerp, Belgium. There, she further cemented her GOAT legacy, breaking record after record on her path to winning five more world medals, including her sixth all-around title.
Biles already had everyone talking during qualifying on Oct. 1 as she was expected to become the first woman to land a Yurchenko double pike vault during international competition. Sure enough, she did it, scoring 15.766. Her effort also earned the vault the name the Biles II.
Another big storyline was Biles’ chance to become the most decorated gymnast of all time. She entered the competition with a total of 32 Olympic and world medals, tied with Larisa Latynina of the former Soviet Union and just one behind Belarus’ Vitaly Scherbo’s long-held record of 33. It didn’t take her long to catch up. On the first day of the women’s finals, Oct. 4, Biles helped Team USA win the gold medal, a record seventh-straight team title, on what she described as an “interesting & unexpected night!” on Instagram afterward.
Two days later, on Oct. 6, Biles was back on the podium to break the tie with Scherbo. She won her sixth all-around gold medal at the world championships, with Brazil’s Rebeca Andrade of Brazil capturing silver and her U.S. teammate Shilese Jones earning bronze. Biles celebrated the historic result afterward, telling the press, “We had our Black podium of girls. … So, hopefully it just teaches all the young girls out there that you can do anything.”
Next up came two days of apparatus finals: vault and uneven bars on Oct. 7, and balance beam and floor exercise on Oct. 8. Biles qualified for each of them and came away with medals in three out of the four events. Her tally included two golds (balance beam and floor exercise) and a silver (vault), which brings her to a whopping 30 world medals, plus her seven Olympic medals.
Biles did it all despite being considered “old” for her sport. At 26 years old and 200 days, she set the mark for oldest world champion and medalist in women’s artistic gymnastics. She also became the oldest all-around, vault, balance beam, and floor exercise medalist. Plus, even though she didn’t finish in the top three on uneven bars this year, she is still the oldest medalist on that apparatus as well, having podiumed there at age 21 and 230 days in 2019.
A recap of Biles’ records from the 2023 world championships:
- Most world medals (30)
- Most combined world and Olympic medals (37)
- Most world gold medals (23)
- Most world all-around titles (6) in women’s (2013-2015, 2018, 2019, 2023)
- First woman to land the Yurchenko double pike vault (now known as the Biles II)
- Part of the U.S. team’s record seventh-straight team title
- Oldest champion and medalist
- Oldest all-around medalist
- Oldest vault medalist
- Oldest balance beam medalist
- Oldest floor exercise medalist
Despite her success, all the records and medals weren’t the important thing for Biles. After her bout of “the twisties” at the Tokyo Olympics, she was just glad to be in competition again. “It’s like as long as I get out there, do those routines again, like it’s a win in my book,” the gymnast said during the championships, per the Associated Press. “It doesn’t matter if I end up on the podium or not.”
