At the last second, U.S. gymnast Jordan Chiles was awarded the bronze medal in the women’s floor final. But, as it turns out, it came four seconds too late.
Chiles initially finished in fifth place with a score of 13.666. Her coach filed an inquiry into the calculation of her difficulty score. It was accepted and her score increased to 13.766, which bumped her up two spots — over Romanian gymnasts Ana Barbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voinea — and into third.
On Saturday, five days after the competition, the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled in favor of Barbosu that Chiles’ inquiry came after the required time frame of one minute. The inquiry was submitted one minute and four seconds after her routine.
Due to the untimely inquiry, Chiles’ initial score of 13.666 was reinstated. Any decisions on the reallocations of medals will be made by FIG, the international governing body for gymnastics, which is expected to “assign the medal(s) in accordance with the above decision.”
Although Barbosu and Maneca-Voinea both received a score of 13.700, Barbosu had a higher execution score which is typically used as a tiebreaker in Olympic gymnastics.
Brazilian Rebeca Andrade won gold with a score of 14.166 and American Simone Biles took silver with a 14.133.
USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committe released the following joint statement:
“We are devastated by the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruling regarding women’s floor exercise. The inquiry into the Difficulty Value of Jordan Chiles’ floor exercise routine was filed in good faith and, we believed, in accordance with FIG rules to ensure accurate scoring.”
Throughout the appeal process, Jordan has been subject to consistent, utterly baseless and extremely hurtful attacks on social media. No athlete should be subject to such treatment. We condemn the attacks and those who engage, support or instigate them. We commend Jordan for conducting herself with integrity both on and off the competition floor, and we continue to stand by and support her.”
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