If it were up to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, Jordan Chiles would retain her bronze medal for her women’s gymnastics floor routine at the Paris Olympics, and Romanian gymnasts Ana Bărbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voinea would also receive one each. to get.
But in a 29-page detailing of the ruling that led to Olympic officials stripping Chiles of her first individual medal, CAS said the world gymnastics governing body had bungled the administration of the event and was unwilling to make up for it by all three to give gymnasts an award. medals, even though each of the athletes had arguments for the bronze.
The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) also failed to track the timing of an investigation by Chiles’ coach into her score during the Aug. 5 competition, a time period that CAS called a “failure.” Ultimately, the court ruled that the inquiry came four seconds after the allowed one-minute period in which Chiles’ score could be checked.
The details from CAS on Wednesday roundly blamed FIG for the problems that arose during one of the most dramatic moments of the Paris Games. After the match, Romanian officials appealed to the court, which had established a three-person panel at the Olympics specifically to settle disputes.
The panel said it was limited in its assessment, leading to heartbreak for the athletes.
“Had the panel been able to apply fair principles, it would certainly have awarded a bronze medal to all three gymnasts, given their performance, good faith and the injustice and pain to which they have been subjected, in circumstances where the FIG did not provide any mechanism or arrangement to implement the one-minute rule,” the court said.
The explanation of the ruling also detailed other serious issues surrounding the administration of the floor exercise, which ended with Rebeca Andrade of Brazil winning gold and Simone Biles of the United States winning silver.
Since then, the score for Chiles, Bărbosu and Maneca-Voinea has become one of the most controversial and closely watched sagas of the Paris Games.
“The panel expresses the hope that in the future the FIG will address the consequences of this case, with regard to these three extraordinary athletes as well as other athletes and their support staff, so that this will never happen again,” CAS wrote in its report. pronunciation.
The gymnastics association did not return requests for comment.
USA Gymnastics, which was denied the opportunity to provide new evidence to CAS, vowed to once again appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal, the body that gives CAS its legitimacy for arbitrations. Successful appeals to the Swiss tribunal are rare.
USA Gymnastics said Wednesday that CAS data released earlier in the day showed that USA Gymnastics did not have enough time to properly make its case for Chiles, and that it believes Chiles’ coach Cecile Landi made her review 47 seconds after the score was published, submitted.
“We will pursue this and other cases on appeal as we continue to seek justice for Jordan Chiles,” USA Gymnastics said.
In her first time speaking directly about the controversy, Chiles posted on X on Thursday: “I will approach this challenge as I have done others – and will do everything I can to ensure justice is done.”
She hopes her bronze remains just that. Her bronze.
“I believe that at the end of this journey, the people in charge will do the right thing,” Chiles said.
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In a separate statement Wednesday, CAS walked back a New York Times report that the panel itself had a matter of conflict because its head, Hamid G. Gharavi, had represented Romania in separate arbitration cases for nearly a decade.
Gharavi serves as legal counsel for Romania for disputes handled by the World Bank’s International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes, The Times reported.
CAS said it “condemns the outrageous statements published in certain US media alleging, without knowledge of the above and before reviewing the reasoned ruling, that the Panel, and more particularly its Chairman, was biased due to other professional obligations or for reasons of nationality. .”
The court said Gharavi’s participation was not challenged during the gymnastics arbitration, so “it can reasonably be assumed that all parties were satisfied with the hearing of their case by this panel.”
USA Gymnastics said it had not seen any revelations about Gharavi or any other panelist, “nor have we seen the revelations to date.”
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At the heart of the competitive dispute is Chiles’ coach Landi’s investigation into how Chiles’ floor routine was scored. Chiles initially scored a 13.666, placing fifth. She was the last of nine gymnasts to compete, which gave her only one minute to initiate an investigation under FIG rules.
The judges immediately allowed the investigation and increased Chiles’ score by 0.1 to 13,766. This put her ahead of Bărbosu and Maneca-Voinea, who each scored 13,700. (Bărbosu had an advantage over Maneca-Voinea due to a better execution score, meaning the judges thought she had a cleaner routine.)
In one of the more emotional scenes of the Games, Chiles shouted with joy, while Bărbosu, who thought she had won bronze, dropped her Romanian flag in shock and left the floor in tears.
But the appeal to CAS by the Romanian Gymnastics Federation showed that the timing of the investigation was too late.
After CAS announced its initial ruling on Saturday, FIG changed the final rankings and the International Olympic Committee said it would hand over the Chilean medal to Bărbosu.
According to the Romanian federation, Bărbosu will receive her medal during a ceremony on Friday.
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In the ruling shared Wednesday, CAS said FIG does not have a mechanism to immediately find out whether an investigation was out of time, even if the investigation was submitted electronically.
Donatella Sacchi, chair of FIG’s Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Technical Committee, said when the survey arrived, “the information provided no indication that it was received too late.”
CAS said it was logical for Sacchi to proceed with the assumption that the investigation was timely, as there was no intent to immediately demonstrate that it was too late.
“If the FIG had introduced such a mechanism or arrangement, much of the grief would have been avoided,” CAS said.
FIG also could not identify the name of the person who conducted the investigation because the person was appointed by local organizers, Sacchi said.
Landi appeared as a witness at the hearing and said she knew the one-minute rule and “believed she had done the investigation as quickly as possible.”
CAS continued: “She could not say for certain whether she had done the investigation within or outside the one-minute time limit because everything had been done in great haste.”
(Photo: Naomi Baker/Getty Images)