No Golden Send-Off for Simone Biles

Simone Biles didn't get the golden send-off she'd hoped for. Biles earned silver in the floor exercise finals Monday—her 11th Olympic medal—after a routine that included a couple of costly steps out of bounds. Brazil's Rebeca Andrade became the first gymnast to beat Biles in a floor final in a major international competition, reports the AP, posting a score of 14.166 that finished just ahead of Biles at 14.133. Jordan Chiles, a longtime friend of Biles, earned the bronze. The 27-year-old Biles, considered the greatest in the history of the sport, wasn't at her usual best during a routine set to music from pop icons Taylor Swift and Beyonce. Still, she boosted her medal haul in Paris to four: gold in the team, all-around, and vault finals, and a silver that came as a surprise in her signature event.

Biles' medal total (including seven gold, two silver, two bronze) ties Czechoslovakia's Vera Caslavska for the second-most by a female gymnast in Olympic history. She missed a chance to add a fifth Paris medal earlier Monday when she fell during the beam final, finishing fifth. Her tumbling passes weren't perfect—she stepped out of bounds twice—but her difficulty is usually so far above everyone else that it hardly matters. Not this time. She received a 7.833 execution score that included 0.6 in deductions for stepping out of bounds, allowing Andrade to win her second Olympic gold. Still, Biles ended nine days in Paris by silencing her critics from Tokyo three years ago. She won four medals in all, just one less than she did eight years ago in Rio de Janeiro.

The floor routine ended with Biles blowing a kiss, a little wink that she has incorporated into her program in various forms for years. Whether it served as a kiss goodbye remains anyone's guess—maybe even Biles'. She has stayed relatively quiet on what lies ahead for her beyond the Paris Games, though she did nudge the door open for a possible return when the Olympics shift to Los Angeles in 2028. "Never say never," Biles said earlier in the Games. "Next Olympics are at home. So you just never know. I am getting really old." (More Simone Biles stories.)