The United States women’s gymnastics team, led by Simone Biles, earned a record-tying seventh consecutive team title at the global championships on Wednesday night.
With a cumulative score of 167.729 points, the American team consisting of Biles, Jones, Blakely, and Leanne Wong defeated both Brazil and France.
After the Americans’ impressive performance in qualifying, the final turned out to be a closer match than expected, with the U.S. team winning by a margin of 2.199 points.
Since 2011, the ladies from the United States have won gold in the team event at every global tournament that has had a team competition. After their triumph in Antwerp, Biles became the most decorated female gymnast in history, breaking a tie with the Chinese men for the greatest run of straight team titles.
Together with her seven Olympic medals, which include the gold medal from the 2016 Games, Biles now has 26 world championship medals, 20 of which are gold. Her 33 total medals in the two major tournaments in the sport are one more than Soviet Larisa Latynina’s total.
Joscelyn Roberson was forced to leave the competition before it even began because it appeared that she had injured her ankle warming up at the vault, but the American team overcome this setback. Wong helped her off the mat and replaced her.
With a simple hop, Jones opened the competition for the Americans with a Double Twist Yurchenko. Before Biles decided to forgo her Sunday qualifying performance on the Yurchenko Double Pike in favor of the somewhat safer “Cheng” vault, Wong handled the last-minute call with precision.