What Is a Biles Skill? Every Named Biles Element Explained

Because Simone Biles has had more than one skill formally recognised and named after her, “a Biles” isn’t a single move — it depends on which apparatus and which specific element is meant.

Why there’s more than one

Skill naming happens apparatus by apparatus, tied to the specific element first performed and formally recognised — see how gymnastics skills get named. Having named elements on more than one apparatus is unusual and reflects a career associated with unusually high difficulty across multiple events, not one specialism.

The five Biles elements

Vault

• Biles — a round-off entry with a half turn onto the table, followed by a front layout salto with two twists in the air. It’s an upgrade of the earlier “Cheng” vault (which has one and a half twists), and first credited to Biles after the 2018 World Championships.
• Biles II — a Yurchenko double pike: a round-off onto the springboard, back handspring onto the table, then two piked salto rotations in the flight phase. It’s regarded as the most difficult vault currently performed by a woman in competition, first credited after the 2023 World Championships in Antwerp.

Floor exercise

• Biles — a double layout salto (fully extended, no tuck or pike) with a half twist added on the second flip, sometimes called a “double layout half out.” First credited after the 2013 World Championships.
• Biles II — a triple-twisting double tucked salto: two backward tucked rotations combined with three full twists, often described as a “triple-double.” First credited after the 2019 World Championships.

Balance beam

• Biles — a double-twisting double tucked salto backward, performed as the routine’s dismount. First credited after the 2019 World Championships.

Why a submission isn’t a naming

A skill only earns a gymnast’s name once it’s actually performed at an eligible international competition and formally recognised by the FIG technical committee — proposing or training a skill isn’t enough. Biles submitted an original uneven bars element (a clear hip circle forward with one and a half turns, built from a Weiler-style entry) ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympics, but she didn’t perform it during that competition, so it wasn’t credited to her. As of this review, she has no named element on bars.