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Biles emerged from the tunnel about an hour and a half ago for her pre-competition warmups. She walked out onto the floor in red sweatpants with a blue shirt alongside teammate and Olympic champion Sunisa Lee before taking the beam in a red, white and blue leotard that we haven’t seen before. She completed a crisp routine on the apparatus capped by a back handspring-back handspring-double pike dismount.
It is a well-known, terrifying and dangerous sensation for gymnasts.
Among many others, Aleah Finnegan, a gymnast on the USA national team, was prompted to speak about the subject on Twitter. “I’ve had the twisties since I was 11,” she wrote. “I cannot imagine the fear of having it happen to you during competition. They have very limited equipment and mats in Tokyo to help something like this get fixed let alone within a day. You have absolutely no control over your body and what it does.”
Related: Simone Biles’ twisties: mental block which puts gymnasts at serious risk
The men’s parallel bars final, starting now, is the first of three event finals during today’s final session of artistic gymnastics in Tokyo. The field includes top qualifiers Zou Jingyuan of China and Lukas Fraser of Germany as well as Team USA’s Sam Mikulak and Great Britain’s Joe Fraser.
The women’s balance beam final is second, followed by the men’s horizontal bar final.
