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What better way to celebrate your daughter winning four medals at the Paris Olympics than a dinner cruise down the Seine?
What better way to celebrate your daughter winning four medals at the Paris Olympics than a dinner cruise down the Seine?
That’s what Simone Biles’ parents, family and friends were doing Monday night after the superstar gymnast finished her sixth and final event of the 2024 Games. The fleet of them — 14 in total who flew out to France to support Biles, 27, in her comeback at these Olympics (minus Biles’ husband, Jonathan Owens, who had to leave early to get back to NFL training camp) — cheers-ed to the now 11-time medalist, the most decorated U.S. gymnast in Olympic history.
Biles’ mom, Nellie Biles, speaking to PEOPLE on Aug. 4, says that the plan was “to eat and toast” to their champion — “We’ll just talk and talk and relive the whole thing,” she says — though “not with Simone, unfortunately.”
“She still goes back to the [Olympic] Village,” Nellie explains, adding that Simone would be stacked up with press obligations on Monday night.
At that point, they’d only been able to see Simone off the competition floor once so far, at a brief celebration after she and Team USA secured gold in the team final. And they “FaceTime and chat, pretty much on a daily basis,” her mom says.
But on Tuesday, she’ll finally get to see her daughter for some one-on-one time, “and that’ll be good,” Nellie says with a big smile.
That’s when Nellie, along with Simone’s dad Ronald Biles, her sister Adria Biles and more of their family, can finally sit down and recap the gymnast’s record-breaking week, which included golds in the team, all-around and vault finals, and a silver medal in the floor final. Simone did all of that while leading the “Golden Girls” of Team USA — Suni Lee, 21, Jordan Chiles, 23, Jade Carey, 24, and Hezly Rivera, 16 — and being an advocate for mental health.