American Olympic gymnast, Jordan Chiles, competed in the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. Due to problems with scoring and appeals from her coaches, she was faced with heightened emotions and many questions surrounding her placement and ability after her bronze medal win in the final floor exercise was changed and revoked. 

          According to the New York Times, Chiles finished her floor routine, which initially left her with a score of 13.666. Chiles’s Coach, Cecile Landi, and Team USA felt as though she had not gotten the correct difficulty score for a dance leap called the “tour jete full,” Therefore they appealed to the judges in hopes of getting a higher score for the gymnast. 

           “The judges are in a time crunch when scoring,” senior Sydney Mullen said. “So I think it would help if they got a few minutes between each routine to ensure that they properly scored every gymnast to the best of their ability.” 

             After her coaches sent in the appeal, the judging panel made the decision to raise Chiles’s score from a 13.666 to a 13.766, which moved her from fifth place to third place. Team Romania was not pleased with this decision and stated that the appeal from Team USA was sent in four seconds after the one-minute deadline.

          “I was really surprised when I saw that the judges actually changed her score,” freshman Avery Mullen said. “And when I saw her name get moved up from fifth to third on the podium.”

              On August 5th, 2024, the Court of Arbitration for Sport(CAS) revealed that the inquiry sent in by Chiles’s coaches was invalid and that Chiles’s third place bronze medal would be taken away from her. On August 11th, 2024, she returned the medal to the International Olympic Committee(IOC) upon this, Barbosu was ultimately awarded third place again and the medal.

              “As a gymnast, I felt devastated for both of them because, at the end of the day, it’s not either of their faults,” said S. Mullen “But they are the ones paying the price for others’ mistakes.”