10 Things You Didn’t know about Simone Biles
She is probably one of the most famous young gymnasts to head to the Olympics in 2016 in Rio, and we cannot help by talk about Simone Biles. She is more than just kind of awesome, and she is more than just kind-of talented. In fact, she is amazing and she is wonderful, and she is making headlines all over the place. Can you tell we are just a little bit more than excited about her? She is someone we cannot get over in terms of her experience and her sheer skill, and we want to be her best friend in real life. She is killing it already at the Olympic games, and there is nothing about her we don’t have a kind-of girl crush on. On that note, we thought we might learn a bit more about Simone Biles and see if she’s actually as cool in real life as she is in the gym (spoiler alert – she totally is).
She loves turtles
Simone Biles is like so many other people in the world; she collects things. Except that she collects turtles. We don’t know – and we kind of don’t want to know – if the turtles she’s collecting are real if or if they are not real. Either way, though, she collects them and she loves them. Since she’s not doing meth or dealing drugs or anything like that, we feel we will just go ahead and support her.
She misses public school
When you are this good at what you do and you qualify for the Olympics, you simply cannot go to a regular school. Simone Biles loves what she does, but it is hard on a young girl to have to be homeschooled, to have her parents’ lives revolved around hers and to have to spend most of her life in the gym or with her work at home so that she can have time to train. It is not something that allows her to spend an hour or two after school working out; it’s a job, full time, all the time.
She trains 6 hours a day
Simone Biles loves what she does for a living, and she is not going to stop doing it anytime in the near future. She is a huge fan of her gymnastics, and she’s working quite hard to make sure she is able to land her routines and her new moves, and she does that six hours a day. She doesn’t do much else other than study and work out, and she loves every second of it. Going to the gym is not something she considers boring or work.
2016 is her first Olympics
It seems that Simone Biles is just so talented that she should have been in London in 2012, but she was too young to qualify. Don’t get us wrong, however. She was likely good enough back then to have made the team, but those pesky rules and expectations and age limits and all of that prevented her from doing so in the manner we would have all liked to see.
She’s a legend
At the moment, she is the only U.S. gymnast who has ever one 14 world titles. That makes her the best, the most famous and probably the most talented gymnast on Team USA, and it makes her even cooler. She’ll still be more talented than any other gymnast on the floor if she doesn’t win a darn thing in Rio, and she is going to be someone who does go down in history for more than just her Olympic career.
She keeps up with the Kardashians
In all fairness, it’s hard not to keep up with them when they are everywhere, all the time. I’m pretty sure I just saw them on the Disney Channel this morning when I was turning on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse for my two-year-old twins. I’m not saying anything about it, but they are everywhere. The only difference is that Simone Biles loves them and actually wants to keep up with them.
She thinks her job is fun
You know that old adage “When you love what you do, you never have to work a day in your life,”? Well, that’s what Simone Biles lives by. That is her life motto, and she loves every second of it. She has said that she does not think that her job is really work, that it’s fun. She probably wouldn’t do it if she didn’t love it, and that’s how her life works at the moment.
She hates bugs
The gym doesn’t scare her, and neither does pretty much anything else in the world, but don’t even put her near a bug. She cannot stand them, she’s terrified of them and she will do anything in her power not to have to spend any time near bugs. She’s just not a fan, and there is nothing wrong with that, to be quite honest. Simone Biles likely does not see many bugs in the gym, so we don’t think it’s that unfair to expect her to be okay with them.
She got a late start in the game
Other American gymnasts such as Aly Raisman began their gymnastics career when they were all of 2 and barely even talking, but Simone Biles did not. In fact, she was 6 when she began her career as an Olympic gymnast (even though she didn’t know then she’d actually be in the Olympics). She was on a school field trip to a gymnastics performance and she was able to imitate them without any fear of the moves she’d never even tried. Her parents knew then she was more than just a little bit talented.
She’s loves Zac Efron
She’d probably marry him, too, but we aren’t sure if he knows that. He seems like a cute kid, though, so we think maybe the two of them would make some seriously cute babies (I know, I know; she’s entirely too young for that for another two decades or so) and he could probably stand someone who has her own amazing career that’s so much more awesome than his. They could make an amazing match, really.
Photo by Getty Images
