The wondrous diversity of Olympic athletes captured in one perfect photo
At their best, the Olympics celebrate human athletic excellence in its myriad shapes and sizes.
A simple photo posted to Twitter by one of the 2016 Olympics' biggest stars captures this sentiment perfectly.
Here's gymnast Simone Biles with another American Olympian -- one who's got two full feet in height on her.
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Biles, as she notes in her caption, stands just 4-foot-8. The fellow next to her? That's American volleyball star David Lee, who towers over Biles at 6-foot-8.
While Lee and the U.S. men's volleyball team aren't expected to contend for gold in Rio, Biles could take home a whopping five gold medals.
Win or lose, though, this photo sums up why the Olympics are such an irresistible human spectacle despite their many problems. Human athletic excellence -- in all its shapes and sizes -- is a marvel to behold.
Topics Olympics
Sam Laird is Mashable's Senior Sports Reporter. He covers the wide, weird world of sports from all angles -- as well as occasional other topics -- from Mashable's San Francisco bureau. Before joining Mashable in November 2011, his freelance work appeared in publications including the New York Times, New York Times Magazine, Slam, and East Bay Express. Sam is a graduate of UC Berkeley and UC Santa Cruz, and basketball and burritos take up most of his spare time. Follow him on Twitter @samcmlaird.
