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Final Five (gymnastics)

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The Final Five celebrating after winning the Women's Team All-Around at the 2016 Summer Olympics

The Final Five was the United States women's team in artistic gymnastics that won the team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. It was the United States' third gold medal in the event and second outside the United States. The five members of the team were Simone Biles, Gabby Douglas, Laurie Hernandez, Madison Kocian, and Aly Raisman, with MyKayla Skinner, Ragan Smith, and Ashton Locklear serving as the three alternates. After the team event, Biles won a gold medal in the individual all-around event, the vault, and on floor exercise and won a bronze on the balance beam, while Kocian won a silver in the uneven bars. The previous team to medal in every event, including the team and individual all-around, was the Unified Team at the 1992 Games; the only previous U.S. team to do so was at the boycott-reduced 1984 Games.

Team background

Raisman and Douglas were both part of the gold medal winning team, dubbed the Fierce Five, at the 2012 London Olympics where Douglas won gold in the all-around and Raisman won gold on the floor event and bronze on the balance beam.

Biles won gold at the 2013 World Championships in the individual all-around and on floor exercise. She also won silver on vault and bronze on balance beam.[1]

Biles and Kocian were part of the 2014 World Championship gold medal winning team. Biles additionally won gold in the all-around, on floor exercise, and on balance beam. She also won silver on vault.[2]

Biles, Raisman, Douglas, and Kocian were all part of the 2015 World Championship gold medal winning team. Biles won gold in the all-around and Douglas won the silver. Biles also won gold on floor exercise and balance beam and won bronze on the vault. Kocian won gold on the uneven bars in a four way tie.[3] Thus making Biles the reigning world champion in all-around, floor, and balance beam and Kocian the reigning world co-champion on the uneven bars going into the Olympics. Additionally Biles was the reigning national champion as well.

Aly Raisman, the captain of the Fierce Five, was once again selected as team captain.[4]

Biles was chosen by Team USA to be the flag bearer for the closing ceremonies. She was the first American female gymnast to be given the honor.[5]

Olympic Trials

Main article: 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials (gymnastics)

The Women's Gymnastics Olympic Trials took place on Friday, July 8 and Sunday, July 10, 2016 at the SAP Center in San Jose, California.[6]

At the 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials, Biles, Hernandez, and Raisman finished first, second, and third respectively in the all-around competition. Biles finished first on vault and floor exercise, Kocian finished first on the uneven bars, Hernandez finished first on the balance beam.[7] MyKayla Skinner, Ragan Smith, and Ashton Locklear were selected as the three alternates.[8] Full Olympic Trial scores are as follows:[9]

Olympic Trials
Gymnast Vault Bars Beam Floor All-Around
Simone Biles 16.000
16.200
(1)		 14.950
14.900
(=4)		 15.200
14.750
(4)		 15.700
15.550
(1)		 61.850
61.400
123.250(1)
Gabby Douglas 15.100
15.000
(6)		 15.100
15.250
(3)		 13.700
14.100
(11)		 14.650
14.550
(=6)		 58.550
58.900
117.450(7)
Laurie Hernandez 15.150
15.150
(4)		 14.900
14.750
(7)		 15.500
15.700
(1)		 15.300
14.700
(3)		 60.850
60.300
121.150(2)
Madison Kocian 13.900
14.000
(12)		 15.750
15.900
(1)		 14.700
13.850
(9)		 14.250
14.700
(9)		 58.600
58.450
117.050(8)
Aly Raisman 15.250
15.200
(3)		 14.450
14.300
(11)		 14.800
15.250
(3)		 15.450
15.050
(2)		 59.950
59.800
119.750(3)

Nickname

The name Final Five was chosen by the team members. At the 2012 London Games, the team had adopted the nickname "Fierce Five" in response to the media-bestowed nickname "Fab Five". The 2016 nickname was not announced until the team had secured victory in the team event. The name has two meanings: one being that this is the last Olympics where gymnastics teams will be made up of five members (starting in 2020 teams will consist of only four) and the other being that it was the final gymnastics team to be formed under Marta Karolyi as national team coordinator of USA Gymnastics.[10]

2016 Summer Olympics

Main article: Gymnastics at the 2016 Summer Olympics

Qualifications

The United States qualified in first place with an overall score of 185.238, nearly 10 points ahead of second place China who received a score of 175.279. Biles, Douglas, and Raisman competed on all four events. Hernandez competed on vault, balance beam, and floor exercise. Kocian competed only on uneven bars. For the individual all-around competition, Biles, Raisman, and Douglas qualified in first, second, and third place, respectively.[11] Due to the rule allowing only the top two from each country to compete in a World or Olympic individual final, only Biles and Raisman advanced. Douglas had won the all-around at the 2012 London Olympics.

Biles qualified first on the vault, balance beam, and floor exercise; Kocian qualified first on the uneven bars; Raisman qualified second on the floor exercise; Hernandez qualified second on the balance beam; Douglas qualified third on the uneven bars. Additionally Douglas and Raisman both finished seventh on the balance beam; Hernandez finished fourth and Douglas finished ninth on floor exercise, but both failed to qualify to the finals due to the two per country rule.[12]

Qualifications
Gymnast Vault Bars Beam Floor All-Around
Simone Biles 16.050(1) 15.000(14) 15.633(1) 15.733(1) 62.366(1)
Gabby Douglas 15.166 15.766(3) 14.833 (=7) 14.366(9) 60.131(3)
Laurie Hernandez 15.200 15.366(2) 14.800(4)
Madison Kocian 15.866(1)
Aly Raisman 15.766 14.733(22) 14.833(=7) 15.275(2) 60.607(2)
 United States 46.966(1) 46.632(2) 45.832(1) 45.808(1) 185.238(1)
  Qualified for event

Team Final

The Final Five receiving their gold medal

Biles, Raisman, and Hernandez each competed on vault, balance beam, and floor exercise. Kocian, Douglas, and Biles competed on uneven bars. The team scored 184.897, over eight points ahead of second place Russia. For each individual apparatus, the Final Five's combined scores were the highest.

Team Finals
Gymnast Vault Bars Beam Floor Total
Simone Biles 15.933 14.800 15.300 15.800 61.833
Gabby Douglas 15.766 15.766
Laurie Hernandez 15.100 15.233 14.833 45.166
Madison Kocian 15.933 15.933
Aly Raisman 15.833 15.000 15.366 46.199
 United States 46.866 (1) 46.499 (1) 45.533 (1) 45.999 (1) 184.897 (1)

Individual Events

Individual All-Around Finals
Gymnast Vault Bars Beam Floor Total
Simone Biles 15.866 14.966 15.433 15.933 62.198
Aly Raisman 15.633 14.166 14.866 15.433 60.098

In the individual all-around, Biles and Raisman each performed four clean routines, with Biles scoring the highest score on all but the uneven bars, as well as being the only gymnast that day to score above 15 on the balance beam. Biles took the gold medal, 2.1 points ahead of Raisman, who took the silver medal. With this, Biles and Raisman became the second pair of American gymnasts to go 1-2 in the individual all-around in the Olympics, after Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson took gold and silver respectively in 2008 in Beijing.

Event Finals
Gymnast Vault Bars Beam Floor
Simone Biles 15.966 14.733 15.966
Gabby Douglas 15.066 (7)
Laurie Hernandez 15.333
Madison Kocian 15.833
Aly Raisman 15.500

In the vault final, Biles, who was favored to win despite never winning a world title on the apparatus, won the gold medal, becoming the first American gymnast to win the vault title at an Olympic Games.

After qualifying in 1st, Kocian performed cleanly and won the silver medal on uneven bars, finishing behind Russian gymnast and reigning Olympic uneven bars champion Aliya Mustafina. Douglas, who qualified in 3rd behind Kocian and Mustafina, respectively, made a mistake on one of her pirouettes and placed seventh.

In the balance beam final, Hernandez won the silver medal, finishing behind the Netherlands' Sanne Wevers. Biles suffered a shocking mishap when she put her hands on the beam after a balance check on her front tuck. Despite the mistake, her score was high enough to win her the bronze medal.

Copying the results of the individual all-around, Biles and Raisman won gold and silver respectively in the floor exercise event final, competing the two highest difficulty routines in the competition.

Post-Olympics

Laurie Hernandez competed on and won season 23 of Dancing with the Stars. She was partnered with Valentin Chmerkovskiy.[13]

Simone Biles competed on season 24 of Dancing with the Stars. She was partnered with Sasha Farber. They finished fourth.[14] Farber later helped choreograph a floor exercise routine that Biles debuted in the 2021 U.S. Classic.

Madison Kocian went on to compete at the collegiate level for the UCLA Bruins.[15] She, along with Fierce Five member Kyla Ross, made history by becoming the first Olympic gold medalists to compete in NCAA gymnastics[16] in a team managed and then later assistant coached by another Fierce Five member, Jordyn Wieber.

After the Olympics, it came to light that all five of the Final Five, plus at least one of the three alternates, had been abused sexually, verbally, and/or emotionally while training in gymnastics.[17] The prevalence of abuse in gymnastics was widely discussed in the media after the USA Gymnastics sex abuse scandal became public.

Simone Biles
Gabby Douglas
Laurie Hernandez
Madison Kocian
Aly Raisman
The Final Five

See also

  • Magnificent Seven, the U.S. 1996 Summer Olympics women's artistic gymnastics team
  • Fierce Five, the U.S. 2012 Summer Olympics women's artistic gymnastics team
  • Fighting Four, the U.S. 2020 Summer Olympics women's artistic gymnastic team

References

  1. ^ "U.S. gymnastics wraps up most successful World Championships ever". NBC Sports. October 6, 2013.
  2. ^ "2014 World Championships Results, Recaps, Photos & Videos". USA Gymnastics. October 15, 2014.
  3. ^ "46th ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS, GLASGOW (GBR)" (PDF). USA Gymnastics. October 27, 2015.
  4. ^ "Aly Raisman, Chris Brooks named captains of U.S. Olympic gymnastics teams". NBC. July 25, 2016.
  5. ^ Axon, Rachel (20 August 2016). "Simone Biles chosen to carry U.S. flag at closing ceremony of Rio Olympics". USA Today. Retrieved 25 October 2016.
  6. ^ "US Women's Gymnastics Olympic Trials 2016: Dates, TV Schedule and Live Stream". Bleacher Report. July 6, 2016.
  7. ^ "2016 U.S. Olympic Trials - Women Day 2" (PDF). USA Gymnastics. July 10, 2016.
  8. ^ "Meet Team USA: Gymnastics". NBC Olympic broadcasts. July 10, 2016.
  9. ^ "2016 U.S. Olympic Trials - Women Day 2 Event Results - Multi" (PDF). USA Gymnastics. July 10, 2016.
  10. ^ "Why U.S. women's gymnastics team chose the nickname 'Final Five'". NBC. August 10, 2016.
  11. ^ "Olympic Women's Gymnastics 2016: Qualification Scores, Results and Reaction". Bleacher Report. August 7, 2016.
  12. ^ "Women's Gymnastics Rio 2016 Olympics: Qualifying Results". Heavy.com. August 7, 2016.
  13. ^ "Laurie Hernandez Claims DWTS Gold! Olympic Gymnast Vaults to Victory in Season 23". People Magazine. November 23, 2016.
  14. ^ "DWTS Judges Were Just as Shocked as Anyone That Simone Biles Was Eliminated". People Magazine. May 15, 2017.
  15. ^ "UCLA gymnastics has an Olympic aura surrounding its program". LA Times. March 10, 2017.
  16. ^ "Madison Kocian, Kyla Ross make history with NCAA gymnastics debuts". NBC Sports. January 9, 2017.
  17. ^ "Abuse suffered by Laurie Hernandez further tarnishes the Final Five's 2016 gold medals". sports.yahoo.com. Retrieved 2020-05-07.
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