Love is truly in the air this year… or at least it is for Olympic gymnast Simone Biles, who got engaged a day after Valentine’s. In a carousel post on Instagram, the world champion shared the wonderful news with candid shots of the proposal, made by her boyfriend-turned-fiancé, Jonathan Owens. She captioned the post, “THE EASIEST YES. I can’t wait to spend forever & ever with you, you’re everything I dreamed of and more! Let’s get married FIANCÉ.”
Check out the engagement photos below.
While Biles is a pretty common face and personality, many would be curious to know more about her football-playing fiancé, Owens.
Who is Jonathan Owens?
The 26-year-old was born in St. Louis Missouri and had his football beginnings there. He began playing in high school and continued in college at Missouri Western State University, where he majored in pre-physical therapy, hoping to one day become a doctor, according to a profile on the school website.
In 2018, he signed with the Arizona Cardinals as an undrafted free agent, but a knee injury kept him from playing and was later released in 2019. By September of that year, he was signed to the Houston Texans’ practice squad and signed a reserve/future contract in Jan. 2020. Owens shuffled between the practice squad and the active roster for months and most recently got promoted to the active roster again on Dec. 4, 2021. His first career interception and fumble recovery came a day after Christmas last year, where the Texans’ won over the Los Angeles Chargers.
Jonathan Owen’s relationship with Simone Biles
According to US Magazine, the couple met in March 2020 on the dating app Raya. Speaking on her Facebook Watch series, Simone vs Herself, Owens revealed he had no idea who his fiancée was at the time:
Her work ethic was really the first thing that caught my eye. I never really watched gymnastics before I first started talking to her. When I met her, I honestly didn’t know who she was. It was just like, ‘Oh, she has a lot of followers — she must be pretty good or something.’
The couple have been together since, and show up frequently on each other’s Instagram pages, whether on dates or just hanging out. Luckily, the two of them are based in Texas, according to Elle. Biles trains at the World Champions Center in Spring, Texas, while Owens is based in Houston, a short drive away.
The pair are also dog lovers and have Instagram accounts for their dogs. Owens has an English Bulldog called Zeus, while Biles has two French Bulldogs, Aliko and Rambo.
In an exclusive interview with The Wall Street Journal, Biles admitted that she made the first move at Owens:
He would say I slid into his DMs. I saw him, and I was like, ‘Oh, he’s pretty cute,’ so I said hi…and then I saw that he was in the Houston area, so we started chatting a little bit, and then we went to hang out a week or two later.
The pair have been supportive of one another’s sports careers on social media, and always praise each other every chance they get, and Owens was vocal about his love and support for the gymnast after she pulled out of the all-around final at the Olympics to focus on her mental health.
While Owens seems to be relatively private, he does credit his mother, Arthurine Cannon as the biggest influence on his personal life and career, and from his social media, is very family-oriented.
Major congratulations are definitely in order for this lovable couple and we can’t wait for them to tie the knot!
