American gymnast Jordan Chiles has had her first-ever Olympic bronze medal stripped from her after a complicated scoring debacle. On August 5th, Chiles was the last athlete to compete on floor and was initially awarded a score of 13.666. This score landed her in fifth place, behind Romanian gymnasts Ana Barbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voinea, both scoring a 13.700 and tying for third place. However, soon after Chiles’ score was released, her coach, Cecile Landi, filed an appeal, stating that a skill that should have given the gymnast higher difficulty points was not taken into consideration. The panel of judges ultimately agreed with this inquiry and added 0.1 to the score. With this new tenth of a point, Jordan Chiles was successfully bumped up to third place, earning a spot on the 2024 Olympic podium.
Unfortunately for Chiles, her win would be short-lived. An official challenge of Jordan’s score was filed with the CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sports) by the Romanian Gymnastics Federation along with Barbosu and Maneca-Voinea. It was argued that the appeal placed by the United States coach was filed 4 seconds past the one-minute period that allows a coach to make a verbal inquiry.
In the week following, both the United States and Romania underwent the appeal process while the Olympics carried on. After listening to both sides at a panel hearing, the Court ruled in favor of the Romanian team, lowering Chiles’ score back down to 13.666 and declaring that the medal would be reallocated to Ana Barbosu. USA Gymnastics is not going down without a fight and has revealed that there is video evidence of Jordan Chiles’ coach placing the appeal at the 47-second mark. Despite this argument, the CAS refuses to consider this evidence, stating that their rules do not allow it.
The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee continues to push back against the CAS, arguing that the CAS has made “significant procedural errors”. The USOPC says that they will continue to fight for the American gymnast and that they remain unwavering in their pursuit of truth.
Currently, it is unclear if Chiles has returned the medal or not. The USA Team is unsure about how long this arbitration will take to work through.
This is the first time in 24 years that a gymnast has been stripped of their medal, and she is the only gymnast to be stripped for a reason that is not age falsification or failed drug tests. Despite this nightmare sparking copious amounts of controversy in the gymnastics community, Jordan has remained mature on her social media accounts. While it is clear that the athlete is heartbroken, with claims such as it is “unjust” and that she has “no words“, she has also come out and said that she is “overwhelmed” with the amount of love and people such as her teammates, friends, family, and coaches who have rallied behind her and shown their unconditional support for her in this hard time. Chiles has stated that she simply wants justice but that she trusts the people in charge to do what is right.
