Simone Biles dominates the field at the US Classic before the Olympic return to Paris this summer

Simone Biles’ road to Paris is off to a great start.

Biles made her season debut Saturday night at the US Classic at the XL Center in Hartford, Connecticut, and she wasted no time dominating the field. She won the all-around title with 59.5 points, marking her highest all-around score since the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. Her score was also nearly two points ahead of the runner-up. Shilese Jones.

Biles had no problems in any of the competition’s events. She performed the Yurchenko double pike, a move that now bears her name and is widely considered the most difficult, on vault to earn a score of 15.600. It was the highest score of the evening.

Biles took second on beam and she won the floor event with a score of 14.800. She also finished strong on the uneven bars and finished behind only Jones. Suni Lee beat Biles on beam.

Biles was also one of eight Olympic and world championship medalists competing, including Lee and Gabby Douglas – although Douglas withdrew from competition after struggling on the uneven bars during her first rotation. Lee only competed on vault, beam and floor. Fellow Tokyo Olympians Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey also finished third and fourth in the event.

Biles hasn’t competed since October, when she led Team USA to the team title at the 2023 World Gymnastics Championships in Belgium. Biles competed in every apparatus in this competition while winning her 20th gold medal and seventh in a row for the United States at the world championships. She also won a historic eighth all-around title at the United States Championships last year, which made her the first gymnast, male or female, to win eight national all-around titles. She also achieved this at age 26, making her the oldest woman to do so.

Naturally, that earned Biles the Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year award last year. She beat out former Iowa Hawkeyes basketball star Caitlin Clark and Spanish soccer star and Ballon d’Or winner Aitana Bonmatí in the voting.

Biles has made it clear that she will compete in the Olympics later this summer in Paris, where she is sure to be one of the most followed athletes as the sports world floods France. This will be her first Olympics since experiencing the twists and turns of the 2020 Games in Tokyo – which largely knocked her out of competition in Japan. So far, though, everything looks good for Biles ahead of Paris.

The Olympic trials will take place June 27-30 in Minneapolis, about a month before the Olympics kick off.