Simone Biles Is Sick and Tired of Being Asked "What's Next" After Olympic Victories

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Gold medalist Simone Biles of Team United States celebrates on the podium during the medal ceremony for the Artistic Gymnastics Women's Vault Final on day eight of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Bercy Arena on August 03, 2024 in Paris, France
(Image credit: Getty Images)

There's one question Simone Biles hates being asked after her Olympic achievements, and TBH, it makes a whole lot of sense.

Taking to X on Aug. 4, the gymnastics icon implored, "you guys really gotta stop asking athletes what’s next after they win a medal at the Olympics"

She added, "let us soak up the moment we’ve worked our whole lives for"

While journalists and fans of Biles' are understandably curious about when we might next see the gymnast compete, it's true that asking that just after she—or any other Olympic medalist—has achieved something spectacular definitely has a way of almost diminishing the value of the achievement.

Further driving her point home, after someone commented on her social media post, "What is your next step after winning Gold medal??" Biles answered, "babysitting the medal." Teehee.

Incidentally, Biles' achievements at the 2024 Paris Olympics are truly remarkable. The gymnast has won a gold medal in the women's gymnastics individual vault final, one for women's artistic individual all-around, and one with Team USA for the women's artistic team all-around—alongside Suni Lee, Jordan Chiles, Jade Carey, and Hezly Rivera.

These are Biles' third Olympic Games, after she already participated in the Rio Games in 2016, and in Tokyo in 2021.

Though she doesn't love the question, the GOAT did oblige a journalist who wanted to know "what's next" for her—i.e. whether she's considering competing in Los Angeles in 2028—during a press conference.

"Never say never," she said. "The next Olympics is at home, so you just never know. But I am getting really old."

Biles, 27, is very obviously not old period, but it's true that she's "old" for gymnastics, with the average age of retirement for female Olympic gymnasts sitting somewhere around 22.

It's not the first time the question of her age—and that of her teammates—has come up in Paris. Last week, Biles shared that her team's nickname is the "golden girls," which she explained was because they're the "oldest Olympic team."

For context, Chiles is 23, Lee is 21, Carey is 24, and Rivera is the youngest Team USA member at just 16 years old.

Iris Goldsztajn
Iris Goldsztajn
Morning Editor

Iris Goldsztajn is a London-based journalist, editor and author. She is the morning editor at Marie Claire, and her work has appeared in the likes of British Vogue, InStyle, Cosmopolitan, Refinery29 and SELF. Iris writes about everything from celebrity news and relationship advice to the pitfalls of diet culture and the joys of exercise. She has many opinions on Harry Styles, and can typically be found eating her body weight in cheap chocolate.