Simone Biles is making a surprise return to elite gymnastics competition — and she could be aiming to make history at the 2024 Paris Olympics

• Simone Biles is returning to the mat for the US Classic, US Gymnastics announced Wednesday. 
• This will be her first competition since taking herself out of some events at the Tokyo Games in 2021.
• If she makes it to Paris 2024, she could break the record for most Olympic medals won by an American female gymnast.

The GOAT is heading back to the mat. 

Simone Biles is making a surprise return to elite gymnastics competition after a two-year hiatus from the sport, US Gymnastics announced on Wednesday.

The four-time Olympic gold medalist is set to compete in the US Classic alongside Sunisa "Suni" Lee — the 2020 Olympic all-around champion — and Jade Carey on August 5 in Illinois. The competition, which is often seen as a lead-in to the national championships, will be Biles' first return to the mat since she took herself out of competition at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Mental-health struggles and a case of "the twisties" — a phenomenon dreaded by gymnasts and divers alike that causes disorientation in the air — forced Biles to withdraw from a total of five medal events at the Tokyo Games. Should she choose to keep competing after the Classic and make a run to the Paris Olympics in 2024, however, the newly married superstar could vie for even more gymnastics history.

With her stunning comeback performance in her last event of the Tokyo Olympics — the balance-beam final — Biles earned a hard-fought bronze, tying Shannon Miller for most Olympic medals won by an American female gymnast with seven apiece. Another trip to the podium in Paris — either as an individual or with her USA Gymnastics teammates — would give the gymnastics legend sole possession of the record.

And she'd be doing it as Team USA's oldest female gymnast in at least 40 years; Biles would be 27 years old by the time she'd head to France for her third games of her illustrious career.

Kathy Johnson Clarke — an American gymnast who was three years younger when she competed at the 1984 Olympics — told the Washington Post she felt "ancient" compared to her gymnastics counterparts at the time.

But if anyone in the sport can manage to do the unimaginable, it's Simone Biles: the gymnast who has become synonymous with surmounting the impossible.