Monday’s beam final at the Paris Olympics was certainly unique, though not in the way organizers may have been hoping.
As gymnasts attempted to win the gold, many noticed something “really weird and awkward” going on in the 10,000-seat Bercy Arena: Audiences were being shushed into silence.
Team USA Olympians Simone Biles and Suni Lee noted as much after failing to make the podium.
For superstar Biles, missing out on a medal was especially surprising given her status as the most decorated U.S. Olympic gymnast of all time, winning her eleventh on Sunday, per NBC News.
Both Biles and Lee said the lack of noise in the arena — mixed with intermittent loud shushing — affected their focus, according to USA Today.
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Most gymnastic events take place alongside several others in a large arena.
As a result, Olympic gymnasts are accustomed to a steady stream of noise as they perform — random clapping and applause for other events mixed in with music and other sounds.
Even at events where this is not the case, like the recent championships in Antwerp, Belgium, music is often played in the background to maintain a certain level of noise, per USA Today.
But, apparently, the organizers of the Paris Olympics had something else in mind entirely for the beam final.
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Speaking with USA Today, a representative for the games said silence was built into the “sports presentation plan at Paris 2024.”
It seems that the actual competitors weren’t read in on this “plan.”
“Even watching the other finals, I was like, ‘It’s a little too quiet in here,’” Lee said.
“When I was up there, I was like, ‘People can probably hear me breathing.’”
Even when the two athletes decided to cheer on each other after big routines, they were shushed.
“You’re trying to stay in your zone, and then people start cheering, and then the shushing gets louder, so really, they should be shushed because they’re louder,” Biles said.
“It was really weird and awkward. And we’ve asked several times if we can have some music or some background noise, so I’m not really sure what happened there. But, yeah, not our favorite. None of us liked it.”
Even Biles’s coach Cecile Landi, a French native, found the procedure to be incredibly odd.
“I’ve competed in France a long time, and it was the first time that I heard anybody shush,” Landi said.
“So it was really strange. I don’t know if they thought the athletes wanted it to be quiet. I can tell them now: No. They did not. They do not like it.”
