If it was up to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, Jordan Chiles would keep her bronze medal for her routine in the women’s gymnastics floor exercise at the Paris Olympics, and Romanian gymnasts Ana Bărbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voinea would each get one, too.
But in a 29-page detailing of its ruling that led Olympic officials to strip Chiles of her first individual medal, CAS said the global governing body for gymnastics botched its officiating of the event and was unwilling to make up for it by awarding all three gymnasts medals, even though each of the athletes had arguments for the bronze.
The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) also did not keep track of the timing of an inquiry from Chiles’ coach about her score during the Aug. 5 competition, a lapse CAS called a “failure.” Ultimately, the court ruled the inquiry came four seconds after the allowed one-minute window for Chiles’ score to be checked.
The details from CAS on Wednesday squarely blamed FIG for the problems that arose during one of the most dramatic moments of the Paris Games. After the competition, Romanian officials appealed to the court, which had set up a three-person panel at the Olympics specifically to arbitrate disputes.
The panel said it was limited in its review, leading to heartbreak for the athletes.
“If the Panel had been in a position to apply equitable principles, it would surely have attributed a bronze medal to all three gymnasts in view of their performance, good faith and the injustice and pain to which they have been subjected, in circumstances in which the FIG did not provide a mechanism or arrangement to implement the one minute rule,” the court said.
The explanation of the ruling also detailed other serious issues with 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 scoring for Chiles, Bărbosu and Maneca-Voinea has become one of the most disputed and closely followed sagas of the Paris Games.
“The Panel expresses the hope that the FIG will draw the consequences of this case, in relation to these three extraordinary Athletes and also for other Athletes and their supporting personnel, in the future, so that this never happens again,” CAS wrote in its ruling.
The gymnastics federation did not return requests seeking comment.
USA Gymnastics, which was denied a chance to give new evidence to CAS, promised yet another appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal, the body that gives CAS its legitimacy for arbitrations. Successful appeals to the Swiss tribunal are uncommon.
USA Gymnastics said Wednesday the CAS details released earlier in the day showed USA Gymnastics did not have enough time to properly make its case for Chiles, and that it believes Chiles’ coach, Cecile Landi, submitted her review 47 seconds after the score was published.
“We will pursue these and other matters upon 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 saying, “I will approach this challenge as I have others — and will make every effort to ensure that justice is done.”
She is holding out hope that her bronze stays just that. Her bronze.
“I believe that at the end of this journey, the people in control will do the right thing,” Chiles said.
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In a separate statement Wednesday, CAS pushed back on a New York Times report that the panel itself had a question of conflict because its head, Hamid G. Gharavi, had represented Romania for nearly 10 years in separate arbitration cases.
Gharavi serves as legal counsel to Romania for disputes handled by the World Bank’s International Centre 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 review of the reasoned award, that the Panel, and more particularly its chairman, was biased due to other professional engagements or for reasons of nationality.”
The court said that Gharavi’s participation was not challenged during the gymnastics arbitration, so “it can reasonably be assumed that all parties were satisfied to have their case heard by this Panel.”
USA Gymnastics said it had not seen disclosures about Gharavi or any other panelist, “nor have we seen the disclosures to date.”
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At the heart of the competitive dispute is the inquiry placed by Landi, Chiles’ coach, about how Chiles’ floor routine was scored. Chiles initially scored a 13.666 to place fifth. She was the last of nine gymnasts to compete, which gave her just one minute to place an inquiry under FIG regulations.
The judges allowed the inquiry in the moment, and raised Chiles’ score by 0.1 to 13.766. That moved her ahead of Bărbosu and Maneca-Voinea, who each scored a 13.700. (Bărbosu had an advantage over Maneca-Voinea due to a better execution score, meaning the judges believed she had a cleaner routine.)
In one of the more emotional scenes of the Games, Chiles screamed in celebration, while Bărbosu, who thought she had won bronze, dropped her Romanian flag out of shock and left the floor in tears.
But the appeal to CAS by the Romanian Gymnastics Federation found the timing of the inquiry was late.
After CAS released its initial ruling Saturday, FIG changed the final standings and the International Olympic Committee said it would reallocate Chiles’ medal to Bărbosu.
Bărbosu is set to receive her medal in a ceremony Friday, according to the Romanian federation.
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In the ruling shared Wednesday, CAS said FIG did not have a mechanism for figuring out immediately whether an inquiry was late, even though the inquiry was submitted electronically.
Donatella Sacchi, president of FIG’s Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Technical Committee, said when the inquiry arrived, “the information offered no indication that it had been received late.”
CAS said it made sense for Sacchi to proceed under the assumption that the inquiry was on time, because there was no setup to immediately show it was late.
“If the FIG had put such a mechanism or arrangement in place, a great deal of heartache would have been avoided,” CAS said.
FIG could also not identify the name of the person who took the inquiry, 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 made the inquiry as fast as she could.”
CAS continued: “She was not able to state with certainty whether she made the inquiry within or beyond the one-minute time limit, as everything had happened in a great rush.”
(Photo: Naomi Baker / Getty Images)