Simone Biles Feud Escalates as Riley Gaines Fires Off Surprising Revelation

Simone Biles and Riley Gaines’ clash began in the initial weeks of June and took different shapes. It started with Gaines’ statement about the Minnesota State High School League’s celebratory post having its comments turned off, due to a trans athlete on their team. And intensified with Biles’ reaction to this. Soon, the virtual feud attracted much back and forth. But just when silence had taken over, another statement came to reignite the debate. How?

It’s been a week since Simone Biles publicly apologized to Riley Gaines following their intense disagreement. Biles wrote in her tweet on June 10, “I’ve always believed competitive equity & inclusivity are both essential in sport. The current system doesn’t adequately balance these important principles, which often leads to frustration and heated exchanges, and it didn’t help for me to get personal with Riley, which I apologize for.” While Gaines had publicly “accepted” the gymnast’s apology.

However, this week, talking to TMZ Sports, Riley Gaines mentioned that she didn’t have any bitter feelings toward Simone Biles. She said, “Look, Simone is someone I’ve looked up to, I’ve respected for so long.” A huge part of that is because Biles, the gymnastics GOAT, has done monumental work for the sport. Gaines agreed to it, saying, “She has done so much for women’s sports, of course, for the sport of gymnastics, but even broader than that for women in general.” After all, Biles has been a staunch advocate for athlete well-being throughout her historic career. She is someone who has truly changed the narrative around mental health awareness after her Tokyo Olympics withdrawal.

But Gaines had her points of disappointment, too. And she did not sugarcoat those. The swimmer confessed that Simone Biles’ stance, “felt so deeply visceral to me not because of the personal attacks, but more so again because of how she used her platform, a platform where young girls all across the nation, young girls like my little sister, who’s a gymnast, look up to her.” This is now the second time Gaines is voicing this stance.

Well, this is very similar to something that Riley Gaines had said back on the Stephen A. Smith Talk show on June 11. She’d said, “What did bother me is knowing the platform that she has and how she was so quick in such a venomous way to sell out young girls like my little sister…” Yes, Riley Gaines’ younger sister, Neely Gaines, is an elite gymnast. Thus, Riley has repeatedly backed this point that her main problem was Simone Biles’ misuse of her platform. On top of that, the use of words like “visceral” does not hint that Riley Gaines is completely over the feud.

After all, she knows that Simone Biles is an inspiration for many. And with over 12.4M followers on Instagram and 1.9M on X, Biles also has a huge following that looks up to her and reads deeply into every word she posts. In such a case, her stance broke Riley Gaines’ heart. But it is also notable that the two have polar opposite takes on matters. Gaines had also said on the Will Cain Show that, “I have a problem with some of the things she said, including the words and phrases, competitive equity, and inclusivity. Look, that is not what competition is about.” Thus, one can say that they continue to stand by their different stances.