Parade to honor homegrown Olympic champion
Vancouver's Jordan Chiles, a silver medalist with the U. S. gymnastics team at the Tokyo Olympics, will be given a parade in her honor and a key to the city on Sunday, Aug. 22, starting at 1 p.m. from the Vancouver Dairy Queen in Uptown Village, and then proceeding downtown. (AP photo)
The community is invited to come out and celebrate as Vancouver hosts a parade on Sunday, Aug. 22 for 2020 Olympic Games silver medal winning gymnast Jordan Chiles, a 20-year-old elite athlete from Vancouver’s Black community. The parade will start at the Dairy Queen in Uptown Village, 2707 Main St., travel down Main to West Sixth Street, downtown, and continue west where it will stop at Vancouver City Hall. Spectators are encouraged to stand on the sidewalk along Main Street to cheer Chiles during the parade. Vancouver Mayor Anne McEnerny-Ogle will then present Chiles with a key to the city in a short public ceremony. The parade will then continue back up Main Street and end at the Dairy Queen.
Vancouver’s Jordan Chiles ends her balance beam routine during the women's artistic gymnastic qualifications at the 2020 Summer Olympics. Chiles won a silver medal for the United Sates in the women’s team final, taking her place on the team after another favorite gymnast Simone Biles withdrew. (AP photo)
Chiles and two other Vancouver-area hometown heroes competed in the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games in Tokyo, Japan, this year. The city also invited Team USA Paralympian Yen Hoang (track and field) and Olympian Kara Winger (track and field) to participate in the parade, but both women are currently out of the country, officials said.
Chiles was born in Tualatin and raised in Vancouver, graduating from Prairie High School in 2019. She competed in the vault, floor exercise and balance beam events at the summer Olympics and won a silver medal for Team USA in the women’s artistic all-around event, substituting for another team favorite Simone Biles who withdrew.
Chiles had secured her spot on the national team by finishing third in the all-around at the U.S. Olympic Trials. She is set to attend UCLA in the fall.