When Jade Carey finished the Paris Olympics — her second Games, both times overcoming adversity to win a gold medal — she figured it was the end of her elite gymnastics career at age 24.
“I feel like I got everything I wanted in gymnastics,” she said this week. “I went to the Olympics twice. I have three medals. I was part of the team. I have accomplished so many things, even more than what I ever would have thought in my life. So, I’m definitely content with what’s happened in my career so far. So that was kind of like, OK, I can walk away from gymnastics being happy with what I’ve done.”
Yet Carey is in the field for the U.S. Classic on Saturday, having returned to elite competition last month for the first time since Paris.
It’s the start of a slow build this season — to the Xfinity U.S. Championships in August in her hometown of Phoenix and, she hopes, an early autumn selection competition for the World Championships team and October’s worlds in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
“I would regret later on not trying again when I knew that I still had some more in me,” she said.
Back in 2024, Carey returned to Oregon State from the Olympics for her final NCAA season.
Elite gymnasts often transition to college — where there’s a different scoring system and often less-difficult routines — and never return to the world stage. However, it has become more common to do both in the NIL era — Carey, Jordan Chiles and Suni Lee went from the NCAA to make the Paris Olympic team.
Carey, who began tumbling as a toddler in her parents’ gym, finished fourth in the all-around at her last NCAA Championships in April 2025.
Then she took the longest break from gymnastics that she can remember. During that time off, she joined the Oregon State staff as a student assistant.
“Once I was around people in the gym again, coaching and stuff, I was like, oh, I miss going upside down,” she said. “So it started with just playing, and then the mindset kind of switched to, well, if I still feel good, then why not?”
She returned to training last December. Her days became long.
Carey worked on wrapping up her degree in digital communication arts (and later gave a commencement address — “I know what it took to get here,” she told her fellow graduates. “The early mornings, the late nights, the pressure, the doubt, and all the moments you weren’t sure you’d make it to this very day. But you did.”)
After coaching during the Oregon State team practices, Carey then did her own workouts.
It took months to feel like herself again, so long that at times she questioned the comeback.
She struggled with basics on uneven bars. Her ankles hurt after doing tumbling passes for the first time on the floor. A left hip injury kept her from vaulting for eight weeks.
Carey responded like she always has. She persevered.
Back at the Tokyo Olympics, she finished last in the vault final. “I know yesterday felt like the worst day of your life,” her dad and coach, Brian, told her then, “but what’s stopping you from making today the best day of your life?” Then Carey went out and captured gold on floor.
In 2024, she competed through illness to help the U.S. win team gold in Paris.
In 2026, she stuck with the return.
“It definitely kind of goes back to (having) nothing to prove,” she said. “I just love to do it and am still capable of it.”
Then on April 25, Carey went public with her comeback in a social media video.
“Gymnastics has always been at the center of my life, and I’ve been doing a lot of reflection,” she said then. “Gymnastics has taught me so many lessons about growth, resilience and passion. The journey hasn’t been easy, but it’s been unforgettable. I wouldn’t be able to do this without the love and support from you all. So thank you. With that being said, I still have more to give, and I’m not done yet.”
Brian had left Paris thinking it was 50-50 whether his daughter would return to elite gymnastics. He’s not surprised.
“I think deep down she would love to have an Olympic experience where it just went a little more smoothly,” he said with a laugh.
It she makes it there, it will be Carey’s last Olympic experience as an athlete.
She’ll be 28, which would break Simone Biles’ record as the oldest U.S. female gymnast at an Olympics since 1952 (a record that Biles can also break, should she decide to come back). No American gymnast — man or woman — has won gold at three Olympics (a feat that Biles and the comebacking Suni Lee can also achieve in 2028).
“The end goal definitely is LA, and I really do see that being the end,” Carey said. “I’ve enjoyed so much — competing, doing gymnastics and pushing myself — but I feel like, definitely after this one, a home Olympics would be so cool that it would just be kind of the perfect way to go out and move on to what’s next.”
