Paris 2024 Olympic Games - Previews - Source: Getty — Simone Biles once opened up on shifting mindset for Tokyo Olympics. PHOTO: Getty Images

"Am I going to sit here, moping around..or get ready?”- When Simone Biles opened up on shifting her mindset for Tokyo Olympics amid COVID-19 struggles

Modified Feb 01, 2025 22:30 GMT

Simone Biles once opened up about shifting her mindset for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Although it was initially a challenging task for the renowned gymnast, she reminded herself that many other athletes were also struggling due to the pandemic’s impact.

In an interview with Marie Claire, the French magazine, Biles was questioned about her initial struggles to maintain a routine following the postponement of the games. During the interaction published in June 2021, she said:

“In the beginning, it was really hard because I was going through so many emotions about the postponement.”

Simone Biles then recalled questioning herself whether she should be moving around aimlessly or start preparing herself for the upcoming challenge. Thus, she adjusted her mindset and began her preparations for the delayed Games.

“But then at the end of the day, it was like, "Okay, you know what? I'm not the only athlete going through this. We do know there's going to be a postponement, it does suck, but what are we going to do about it? Am I going to sit here, moping around, or am I going to try to gear up and get ready and change my mindset?" So that was exactly what I did,” Simone Biles added.

Notably, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had announced the delay of the Games due to the global impact of the pandemic on March 23, 2020.

When Simone Biles opened up about how COVID-19 helped her realize things about herself that she didn’t know before

Simone Biles poses with a necklace in the likeness of a goat at Paris Olympics (Photo: Getty Images)

Simone Biles once shared how the COVID-19 pandemic helped her in discovering a version of herself that she didn’t know existed. She realized that sitting idle and watching the entire series of a show on Netflix was certainly not her thing. During an interview with Olympics.com in April 2021, Biles, who is now a seven-time Olympic gold medalist, said:

“So I feel like the one thing I learned about myself is I really can't sit still. I have way too much energy. I couldn't sit through all of the Netflix shows. I was just so bored so I would clean a lot. And I found that was kind of my saving grace, is like tidying up and being kind of a perfectionist inside the house.”

The 27-year-old further opened up in the interview about how she used to get so bored during the initial pandemic days that she would take her pet dogs out for walks on multiple occasions and gave them a lot of attention.