Jade Carey floor routine fall: Why USA's reigning gold medalist won't defend gymnastics title in 2024 Olympics

Jacob Camenker

•
Jade Carey floor routine fall: Why USA's reigning gold medalist won't defend gymnastics title in 2024 Olympics image

Jade Carey won gold in the floor exercises at the 2021 Olympics. She won't get a chance to repeat that feat in 2024.

Carey struggled during her floor routine at the 2024 Olympics and suffered a fall while trying to land one of her cross-mat routines.

It appeared that Carey had rotated ever-so-slightly too far during her final flip. Both her feet hit the mat, but her weight was behind her, causing her to tumble backward.

That fall — along with some other issues in her execution — caused Carey to score a 10.633, a far cry from the 14.366 that won her gold in Tokyo. Through four of five subdivisions, Carey's score was better than only South Korea's Lee Yunseo (10.066).

What went wrong for Carey? Here's what to know about her floor routine and the ailment that may have caused her to struggle in one of her top events during qualifying.

MORE: Latest updates on Simone Biles' calf injury

What caused Jade Carey's floor routine fall?

Carey explained after her qualifying performance that she was battling an illness while competing at the 2024 Olympics.

"I just have not been feeling well the past few days and haven't been able to eat or anything," Carey told Olympics.com. "I had, like, no energy today and didn't really have a sense of what was going on in my head. So, I just kind of wanted people to know that, so they know that there's actually something wrong."

It isn't clear exactly how long Carey has been ill. Her father and coach, Brian, missed podium training Thursday because of an illness, as USA Gymnastics previously announced.

Either way, Jade seemed pleased that she was able to compete. She posted to X (formerly Twitter) that she "gave it everything [she had]" and was "grateful" for getting a chance to defend her title.

However, her tough outing on the floor will prevent her from defending her lone career Olympic gold medal.

BEST U.S. OLYMPIANS
Top 33 rankings | Simone Biles | Katie Ledecky | Jesse Owens

Will Jade Carey participate in the gymnastics team final?

It isn't clear how Carey's illness will impact her going forward. Presumably, she will be able to compete in Saturday's vault final — for which she qualified by scoring a 14.433, despite her illness.

But Carey's status for Tuesday's team final is murkier. She may well be healthy enough to participate in the competition by then, but if not, Team USA could opt to sub her out for one of their alternates.

Joscelyn Roberson's strengths align best with Carey's, among Team USA's two alternates. The 18-year-old finished fourth on both the vault and the floor at the U.S. team trials, the two apparatuses on which Carey is expected to compete in the team competition.

But given that Carey toughed it out Sunday, she is still expected to participate in Tuesday's event.

Jacob Camenker

Jacob Camenker Photo

Jacob Camenker first joined The Sporting News as a fantasy football intern in 2018 after his graduation from UMass. He became a full-time employee with TSN in 2021 and now serves as a senior content producer with a particular focus on the NFL. Jacob worked at NBC Sports Boston as a content producer from 2019 to 2021. He is an avid fan of the NFL Draft and ranked 10th in FantasyPros’ Mock Draft Accuracy metric in both 2021 and 2022.