From a wooden balance beam to the worldwide stage, Sunisa “Suni” Lee made history as the first Hmong American athlete to qualify for the Olympics. The 18 year old from Saint Paul, Minnesota started gymnastics at the age of six and has been on the national team since 2017. During the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Lee won gold in the womens all-around final, silver in the group all-around final, and bronze on the uneven bars.
On July 27, the U.S. women\’s gymnastics team won silver in the group all-around final. Much of the focus during this event was towards Lee’s teammate, Simone Biles, who withdrew from the competition because of mental health concerns after struggling on the vault. Lee, along with the other gymnasts, Jordan Chiles and Grace McCallum, supported Biles but admitted to the increase in pressure after her decision.
Specifically for Lee, it meant that she would have to participate in the floor exercise in addition to the uneven bars and balance beam which she was not expecting. However, Lee received a score of 15.4 on the uneven bars, the highest score any athlete has received on bars in Olympic history. In combination with her teammates’ scores, the team finished in second place and was awarded silver. Afterward, in an interview, Lee stated, \”When we had to step up to the plate and do what we had to do, it was very hard and stressful. But I\’m very proud of us, because we did it.\’\’
The next competition for Suni Lee was the individual all-around final. Still nervous from Biles’s withdrawal, Lee was able to finish all four events with a total score of 57.433, making her an Olympic gold medalist. Lee recalled, \”Knowing that Simone was gone, I feel like people kind of put that pressure on me that I had to come back with a medal.” With that, Lee became the first Asian American woman to take gold in the gymnastics all-around.
A few days later, Lee competed in the uneven bars final. Although this event is one of Lee’s best, she admitted that social media caused her to lose focus after winning gold. Lee received a score of 14.5 which landed her a bronze medal. Despite not being in first place, she told People, “‘This medal probably means more to be than the all-around gold medal did, just because bars is my thing.’”
Lee has overcome countless obstacles within the past two years that led up to this moment. In 2019, her father fell off a ladder and became paralyzed from the chest down, and in 2020, her aunt and uncle passed away due to COVID-19. Suni Lee has also withstood several injuries such as a broken bone in her foot and an Achilles tendon injury.
Through all of the hardships in her life, Lee has always had her family and her home Hmong community to support her. A crowd of Lee’s hometown family and friends watched as her score on the floor exercise was announced which assured her gold medal win. Lee’s Hmong community in Minnesota is one of the largest in the United States and has supported her gymnastics career since the beginning.
It is known that gymnastics is an expensive and time-consuming sport and the community Suni Lee grew up in, for the most part, was not wealthy. As a young girl, Lee was very active and started practicing gymnastics on a wooden balance beam her father built in their backyard. In a TODAY interview, Suni Lee reunited with her family for the first time after the Olympics and placed two medals around her mother and father. Her father said, \”That beam was built out of a piece of wood. I never thought I\’d be wearing one of these (medals) because of that beam,\” (TODAY).
Suni Lee’s historic performance at the Olympic games has proven to be a momentous moment for all Hmong people. Google reported a spike in search trends for Hmong during the 2020 Olympics as people are becoming more aware of the role Hmong people played in American history. There is also a large cultural shift happening within the Hmong community. Because they have suffered so much, women and children were discouraged from playing sports but now, Lee’s performance shows the importance of allowing children to pursue their dreams. Sia Lo, a distant relative of Lee, told the Star Tribune that, “ We hope all of America is proud of Suni. What she\’s achieved showcases what is possible here in the United States.”