Simone Biles
2019 World Championships

During qualifications at the World Championships, Biles helped the USA qualify for the team final in first place, over five points ahead of second-place China. Individually, she qualified for the all-around, balance beam, and floor exercise finals in first place, the vault final in second place by a margin of one one-thousandth below teammate Jade Carey, and the uneven bars final in seventh place. She debuted two new eponymous skills: the Biles II on floor exercise, a triple-twisting double-tucked somersault, and the Biles on balance beam, a double-twisting double-tucked somersault dismount. Both elements were given the highest difficulty rating of J (1.0) for all elements on their respective apparatus, and the Biles II is the only element in artistic gymnastics to receive the J rating across all disciplines for both men and women.

In the team final, Biles led Team USA to its fifth consecutive team title, contributing scores of 15.400, 14.600, 14.433, and 15.333 on vault, uneven bars, balance beam, and floor exercise, respectively. In doing so, Biles surpassed Russian gymnast Svetlana Khorkina as the most-decorated female gymnast in World Championship history. Her scores on vault, balance beam, and floor exercise were the highest of the day. During the all-around final Biles won gold with a score of 58.999, a record-setting 2.1 points ahead of second-place finisher Tang Xijing of China. Once again, she recorded the highest scores of the day on vault, balance beam, and floor exercise.

During the first day of event finals, Biles won the gold on vault, ahead of teammate Carey and Ellie Downie of Great Britain. After earning a medal on vault, her 23rd World Championships medal, Biles tied the record for most medals won at the World Championships with male Belarusian gymnast Vitaly Scherbo. During the uneven bars final, Biles earned a score of 14.700, ranking fifth, one-tenth behind bronze medalist and teammate Sunisa Lee.

On the second day of event finals, Biles scored 15.066 on the balance beam, earning the gold medal over reigning World balance beam Champion Liu Tingting and Li Shijia, both of China, by over 0.6 points. This marked Biles's 24th World Championships medal, surpassing Scherbo's record and making Biles the sole record holder for most World Championship medals won by a gymnast, whether male or female. Before the final, Biles credited her improved confidence on beam in the past year to her coach Cecile Canqueteau-Landi, who helped rework her routine following shaky performances in the event finals at the 2016 Summer Olympics and the 2018 World Championships. Biles and Landi removed inconsistent skills including the Barani, front pike, and front tuck saltos, replacing them with skills such as an aerial cartwheel (which Biles had not performed since 2014) and introducing the upgraded Biles dismount.

On floor exercise, Biles won gold with a score of 15.133, one point more than the silver medalist Lee. By winning five gold medals in Stuttgart, Biles tied the record of most gold medals won at a single World Championships with Larisa Latynina and Boris Shakhlin, who both accomplished this at the 1958 World Championships. Furthermore, by winning her fifth gold medal on floor exercise, Biles tied the record for most world titles on one apparatus with Italian Jury Chechi (who won five gold medals on still rings) and Russian Svetlana Khorkina (who won five gold medals on uneven bars).
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