Simone Biles was recognised as the Comeback of the Year at the 2024 Laureus World Sports Awards. This year, the artistic gymnast capped off her dazzling “Redemption Tour” by winning the biggest award at the prestigious event as she was named the World Sportswoman of the Year for the fourth time in her career on Monday (21 April)
The USA gymnastics icon shook up the sports world when she withdrew from the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, sparking a new era in conversations about mental health among athletes and helping others to be more open about the challenges they were facing. When Biles returned to the Olympic stage at Paris 2024 after taking a two-year break from sport, every step she made was put under the microscope but, true to her campion nature, she delivered under the biggest pressure.
Competing at her third Olympic Games at age 27, Biles captured gold in the women’s all-around and vault. In that quest, she performed an element called in her honour, the Biles II – a Yurchenko double pike. Biles also helped USA to gold in the team event and picked up silver in the floor exercise. “It’s definitely been really special throughout this whole entire year that I was training up to Paris,” Biles said at a press conference after receiving her award. “The most important thing for me was making sure my mental health was as healthy as I could be, and then going into Paris was a breeze just because I had been training for so long.
“Coming out here and winning a Laureus Award, I feel like is the most prestigious, athletic achievement that you can win. So it’s really exciting it puts gymnastics on the map in a non-Olympic year, so hopefully we can keep doing that.” The Paris 2024 campaign brought Biles’ total Olympic medal haul to seven gold, two silver and two bronze medals. With her 30 world championships medals, including 23 gold, there is no other artistic gymnast who has more Olympic and world medals combined.
Biles previously won the Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year award in 2017, 2019 and 2020: “I won this Award for the first time in 2017 and Laureus has been a part of my story since then, and I share their belief that sport has the power to change the world,” the seven-time Olympic champion said. “That might be a little girl watching someone like me on television and deciding she can do it, too. Or it could be the incredible work Laureus Sport for Good has undertaken for the past 25 years, all over the world.”
Other nominees for the World Sportswoman of the Year in 2025 included last year’s winner, Spanish footballer Aitana Bonmati, tennis ace Aryna Sabalenka, and athletics stars Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone of USA, Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands and Faith Kipyegon of Kenya.
