Paris Olympics 2024: Simone Biles seemingly claps back at ex-teammate who criticized gymnasts' work ethic

She's the oldest and most decorated athlete in U.S. gymnastics.

And whaddya know? Simone Biles is a bit of a mother bear, too.

The five-time gold medalist (so far) took to Instagram on Tuesday to clap back at former teammate McKayla Skinner's weeks-old remarks that gymnasts these days "don't work as hard as they used to."

Biles, who has nine million Instagram followers, headed to the platform after the U.S. team gold medal victory and posted a picture of the five athletes with the caption "lack of talent, lazy, olympic champions."

The post had more than 2.2 million likes by early Wednesday morning.

Skinner's comments came in a since-deleted YouTube video following the Olympic trials in late June in which she said that, other than Biles, "a lot of girls don't work as hard" and "don't have the work ethic."

She also suggested in the video that the U.S. Center for SafeSport, a nonprofit created seven years ago with a mission to end abuse in sport, was partially to blame for the perceived slide in effort because "coaches can't get on athletes, and they have to be really careful what they say."

"To get where you need to be in gymnastics," Skinner said, "you do have to be, I feel like, a little aggressive and a little intense."

Skinner spent the early days of July in pre-Olympic damage control, posting her own Instagram story that claimed her controversial remarks weren't "necessarily about the current team," and delivered a statement via social media saying she hadn't intended to "offend or disrespect any of the athletes."

Skinner was an alternate on the U.S. team at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, where Biles won four gold medals, and Skinner won two silver medals (one individual, one team) at the 2020 Games in Tokyo.

"I have not fully dealt with the emotional and verbal abuse I endured under (former U.S. team coordinator) Marta (Karolyi) that perhaps led to my hurtful comments," she said.