FIELD OF PLAY FOR GYMNASTICS APPEALS: A TIME FOR ARBITRAL RESTRAINT.

While attending the Paris 2024 Summer Olympic Games, I was excited to witness what seemed like the most amazing photo finish on the medal podium. While the Brazilian gymnast Rebeca Andrade stood on the podium to receive her gold medal, the American athletes Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles receiving their silver and bronze medals bowed down to Andrade, indicating to the world that they acknowledged that Andrade gave a better performance. At the time, this felt like the ultimate showing of sportsmanship and humility. Shortly afterward, this ended up being overshadowed by a dispute regarding whether Chiles would be able to keep her bronze medal. The dispute started at the end of Chiles' floor exercise routine. After the score of the routine placed Chiles in fifth place behind the Romanian athletes Ana Barbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voiena, Chiles' coach, Cécile Canqueteau-Landi, challenged the difficulty score that was given for Chiles' routine. Under the rules of the sport, coaches are able to submit an inquiry challenging a difficulty score of a gymnast, with the verbal inquiry required to take place prior to the next competitor finishing their routine and the written inquiry required to take place prior to the rotation ending. In the event that the gymnast competes at the end of the rotation, coaches have one minute to submit their inquiry. As Chiles was the final competitor of her rotation, Canqueteau-Landi therefore had one minute to submit her inquiry. Canqueteau-Landi's challenge was successful, which increased Chiles' score from 13.666 to 13.766, thus moving her from fifth place into third place to receive the bronze medal6. The following day, Barbosu and Maneca-Voiena, along with the Federation Roma7 The appeals were consolidated, within the one-minute time period allotted by the rules.8 The appeal also claimed that the Technical Committee of FIG reviewed the inquiry with bad faith since it did not consult video footage in a proper manner, that the deduction of 0.1 points to Maneca-Voiena's score was erroneous and should be reversed, and advocated in favor of Maneca-Voiena, Chiles, and Barbosu all receiving bronze medals.9 In its decision, CAS determined that Canqueteau-Landi's inquiry was not submitted within the one-minute period allotted.10 In doing so, the panel utilized evidence from - tronically one minute and four seconds following Chiles' score being displayed.11 As a result, the CAS panel hearing the case took away the bronze medal from Chiles and awarded it to Barbosu.12 The panel should not have altered the result of the competition continued to follow the principle of leaving the decisions of referees and judges in place in the absence of extraordinary circumstances, such as arbitrariness, bad faith, or corruption. ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR