Why was U.S. gymnast Jordan Chiles stripped of her bronze medal?

It was one of the iconic images of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris: U.S. gymnasts Jordan Chiles and Simone Biles kneeling on the podium to honour Brazilian gold medallist Rebeca Andrade, as the three women shared Olympic gymnastics’ first all-Black podium.

WATCH | #TheMoment Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles bowed to Rebeca Andrade:

#TheMoment Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles bowed to Rebeca Andrade

CBC gymnastics analyst Kyle Shewfelt recounts the moment gymnasts Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles bowed to Rebeca Andrade after she won gold in the Olympic women’s floor exercise.

But Chiles has since been stripped of her medal, and that memory now carries a complicated and emotional postscript.

What happened? Here’s a breakdown.

Chiles seemingly finishes 5th

On Aug. 5, Chiles was competing in the women’s floor exercise and appeared to have finished fifth.

Ana Bărbosu believed she had won bronze and began celebrating with a Romanian flag.

While Bărbosu was celebrating, U.S. head coach Cecile Landi made an inquiry — essentially a challenge of the judges’ score, which can be changed after video review.

Olympian John Roethlisberger said on NBC’s broadcast that the inquiry was about a leap called a tour jeté full, which the coach felt she didn’t get credit for.

“At this point, we had nothing to lose, so I was like, we’re just going to try,” Landi said after the awards ceremony. “I honestly didn’t think it was going to happen, but when I heard [Chiles] scream, I turned around and was like, ‘What?”‘

Judges had awarded the appeal, adding 0.1 points to Chiles’s score and pushing her past Bărbosu and another competitor — leading to what the athletes thought was the first all-Black gymnastics podium at the Olympics.

4 seconds apparently costs Chiles the bronze 

Romania took their case to the Switzerland-based Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), saying the U.S.’s inquiry was not made within the one-minute window stated in the rules. Romania argued that the Americans missed that time limit by four seconds.

The CAS on Saturday ruled in favour of Romania and ordered Chiles’s bronze medal to be reallocated to Bărbosu.

But wait! U.S. says timing was wrong

On Sunday, USA Gymnastics said it submitted newly discovered video evidence to the CAS that showed the inquiry was submitted 47 seconds after the score was published, well within the one-minute time limit. They say another request was made at the 55-second mark.

But on Monday, USA Gymnastics said the CAS won’t reconsider its decision because it said the rules “do not allow for an arbitral award to be reconsidered even when conclusive new evidence is presented.”

The fallout

USA Gymnastics said Saturday that Chiles had been “subject to consistent, utterly baseless and extremely hurtful attacks on social media.”
 
On Saturday, Chiles posted on her Instagram stories a series of broken hearts on a black background, followed by this statement: “I am taking this time and removing myself from social media for my mental health, thank you.”

Chiles’s mother, Gina Chiles, called out the critics in a post, writing she was “tired” of the derogatory comments being levelled at Jordan.

“My daughter is a highly decorated Olympian with the biggest heart and a level of sportsmanship that is unmatched,” Gina Chiles posted. “And she’s being called disgusting things.”

The Romanian side hasn’t been much happier.

Romanian gymnastics legend and 1976 Olympic champion Nadia Comăneci feared for Bărbosu’s mental health because of the wrenching sequence in which she went from bronze medallist to fourth-place finisher.

“I can’t believe we play with athletes’ mental health and emotions like this — let’s protect them,” Comăneci posted on X earlier in the week.

Bărbosu made it a point after returning home to Romania that she had no problem with Chiles.

“I only want for everybody to be fair, we don’t want to start picking on other athletes of any nationality,” Bărbosu told reporters. “We as athletes don’t deserve something like that, we only want to perform as best as we can and to be rewarded based on our performance. The problems lie with the judges, with their calculations and decisions.”

What’s next?

The dispute over such minute details sets up what could be a months- or years-long legal battle over the gymnastics scores.

USA Gymnastics says it will continue efforts to let Chiles keep the medal.

Any appeal could go to Switzerland’s highest court, the Swiss Tribunal, or the European Court of Human Rights.