Simone Biles Workout Routine: Get In Gold Medal Shape

Simone Biles is hands down one of the greatest athletes to ever do it—her mix of power, precision, and jaw-dropping agility is on another level. I took a closer look at how she trains to stay at the top, from her intense gymnastics sessions to the recovery work that keeps her going strong.

In this article, I break down the core elements of Simone's workout routine and share what makes her approach so effective. Whether you're chasing performance gains or just want to train smarter, there’s a lot to learn from the way she moves, recovers, and shows up every day.

Gymnastics

The majority of Biles's training involves doing what she's training for…gymnastics. Biles spends upward of three hours almost daily working on her vault, beam, bar, and floor skills. We aren't gymnastic pros by any means so that we won't be covering much on this front, but we at least wanted to make sure it was known that this is the largest chunk of her training.

Related: Gymnastics Routine For Beginner Adults

Simone Biles Key Exercises

Before we get into the actual exercises, Simone spends about 30 minutes before training to work on mobility. This involves a lot of resistance band mobility work, including:

• Internal Rotations
• External Rotations
• Banded Shoulder Pass Throughs
• Band Pull Aparts
• Laying Overhead and Waist Touches
• (Not a band exercise) Overhead Single Arm Tricep Extension with lightweight

Ok, now for the actual exercises:

1. Rope Climbs

Biles regularly performs rope climbs in a pike position, using only her arms to pull herself up and bring herself back down. These are great for developing her lat, biceps, and grip strength.

2. Pike Push-Ups

These are great for targeting the shoulders. You should have your feet on a raised surface to put even more tension on your shoulders. A strong shoulder complex is absolutely crucial to launching into the air on vaults and floor routines.

3. V-Sit Up Yoga Block Passes

These are deceptively difficult to perform. Hold a yoga block between your shins, raise it up into a V, grab the block with your hands, return to flat with arms stretched overhead, and then raise it up again, placing the block back between your shins. That's one rep. If your core isn't screaming after these, you didn't do them right, or your name is Simone Biles.

4. Weighted Elevated Hip Hold 

This exercise involves the entire posterior chain. Stand with your upper back on a platform and your feet on another platform. With a dumbbell on your waist, raise your body to flat and hold for as long as you can. You should feel it in your lower back, glutes, hamstrings, and abs.

5. Hanging Leg Raise 

These aren't your typical leg raises with your feet only going to parallel with the ground. Biles brings her toes all the way up to the bar, using the entire possible range of motion. To make this even more difficult, she performs these against a flat surface, eliminating momentum created by swinging.

6. L-Sits 

The L-sit is a brutal way to finish a workout; we're taking it easy with this one. Biles actually does an L-sit into a handstand, but that might be pushing it for anyone who isn't a trained gymnast.

Simone Biles Inspired Workout Routine

Make sure to perform a 20-30 minute mobility warm up before jumping into the workout. Take 1-2 minutes rest between sets.

Cross Training

To maximize her athletic ability, Biles also incorporates crosstraining into her workout regimen. Whether she's swimming for a mile, biking for 10 miles, or going for a hike, she ensures her cardiovascular fitness is up to snuff for performing at the highest level.

Wrap-Up

As you can see, Biles' workout consists of a lot of core work, bodyweight exercises, and work outside the gym. This mix of training styles has provided the foundation Simone needed to dominate the Olympic stage. While doing this training routine probably won't get you a gold medal, you can at least know you're following in the footsteps of the greatest to do it.

Check out our full collection of pro athlete workouts!