When U.S. gymnast Aly Raisman completed her routine on the balance beam during the individual finals Tuesday, she hugged her coach and stared at the scoreboard, waiting to see whether she had done enough to medal.
When the score finally flashed, a nervous Raisman became disappointed.
"Oh, no!" her coach, Mihai Brestyan, proclaimed as he spotted the eerily familiar results.
She had landed in fourth place – again – and just shy of the medal stand for the second time in the Olympics.
What happened next would again thrust the judges, athletes and coaches into a heated debate over Olympic scoring.
As Raisman tried to hold back her disappointment, shouts came from the crowd. U.S. national team coordinator Martha Karolyi, her husband, Bela (who is no longer associated with Team USA but is a constant fixture), and vice president of USA women's gymnastics Kathy Kelly shouted and motioned for Brestyan to file a protest.
They believed that the judges hadn't accurately tabulated her difficulty score, specifically the connections between a few of her elements on the beam. Brestyan raced around the gym to get a form to fill out in the allotted time. Meanwhile, Raisman congratulated Catalina Ponor of Romania, who was in position for bronze.
Raisman and Team USA anxiously stared at the scoreboard as judges from the International Gymnastics Federation reviewed video of her routine.
"It might be a tie," Raisman said: a repeat of the all-around finals. Raisman had tied Russia's Aliya Mustafina, which in the all-around means the lowest score was dropped. Raisman, long seen as the rock of the team, had narrowly missed an individual medal because of the tiebreaker rule. She was worried it would happen again.
And Raisman was right, it was a tie. But her coach quickly reminded her she would end up on the podium because the execution scores alone, not the difficulty, were judged in the tiebreaker.
The scoreboard flashed the official result. The tiebreaker went in Raisman's favor this time, and she received a bronze medal.
It was perhaps one of the longest moments of Raisman's career. But it was not the first time this chaotic scene had played out in the Olympics - or questions about the accuracy of judging had come up.
For years, debate has stirred about how accurately sports can be judged, especially in the Olympics. Many have argued that everything is subjective. And in a sport that comes down to hundredths of a point, that can be everything. As Raisman knows, it can also be the difference between being an Olympic medalist and missing out entirely.
That is part of the reason the inquiry system Raisman's coach used was instituted.
"The inquiry was introduced along with FIG's new scoring system following the 2004 Olympics, where judging disasters marred the men's all-around and high bar finals. (The inquiry replaced an appeals process, which had a far lower rate of overturning scores at the 2004 Olympics, at least)," Nick Zaccardi wrote in a Sports Illustrated column explaining the system, using the acronym for the International Gymnastics Federation. "The FIG did away with the perfect 10 and redid its 'code of points' system with the more complicated two-pronged approach. The benefits of the change included eliminating potential bias in judging, the FIG said in 2005. Video review was also introduced."
Team USA's use of the inquiry in Raisman's case was the third in gymnastics during this Olympics alone.
Japan made a similar request over Kohei Uchimura's score on the pommel horse during the men's team finals.
Uchimura, one of the best men's gymnasts and a hero in his home country, was seen as a lock to propel Japan to a medal. But after his score was shown on the screen, it seemed Japan would be left off the podium. The scores placed China with the gold, Great Britain with the silver and Ukraine with the bronze. Japan, like Raisman, sat in fourth.
As commentators on NBC wondered whether "the greatest gymnast of our time dropped the ball," the camera quickly panned to the judges' table, where a Japanese coach was seen with money in his hand, filling out an inquiry form. FIG requires a payment of $300 to file an appeal. If the score is overturned, the money is returned.
Japan claimed that Uchimura had also been overlooked in the scoring: specifically, that he did connect a handstand before his dismount.
Japan challenged the score given to gymnast Kohei Uchimura on the pommel horse during the men's team final.
An announcement came in Japan's favor. It was one that greatly altered the standings. Ukraine was left without a medal, and the host nation was now taking home the bronze, something the home crowd was clearly displeased about.
During the men’s all-around competition, Germany's Fabian Hambuchen's pommel horse score was also protested, but the committee rejected the appeal.
The nature of scoring in gymnastics, similar to figure skating, has been debated as largely subjective despite attempts to correct concerns through recent FIG changes.
That's something Romania's Ponor, who lost out on a medal after Raisman's challenge, and her coach now know all too well. Ponor's face went from excitement to disappointment in the course of a few minutes. Coach Yuliy Kuksenkov who said after the ruling that "life is life," perhaps best capturing many people's thoughts regarding the routine disagreements about scoring.
"In athletics, 100 meters is just 100 meters," Sports Illustrated quoted him as saying. "Sometimes in gymnastics, it's 95 meters or 105 meters."
It's not all about gymnastics, though.
A scoring controversy in fencing last week left South Korea's Shin A-Lam in tears - and left her refusing to leave the piste. She appealed to judges over a delayed and stuck clock that had resulted in extra points being awarded to Britta Heidemann of Germany. Had she left the piste during the appeal, it would have signaled she agreed with the judges.
YouTube: A Lego re-enactment with the play-by-play, created by The Guardian
The South Korean was photographed sitting in the same spot for more than 70 minutes as she awaited the appeal and then refused to leave after it was handed down. She was finally escorted off the stage, sobbing.
South Korea's Shin A-Lam was finally escorted off in tears.
"I did everything I could," Shin told Reuters after the match. "They said 'your fencer has to continue the match,' so I had to accept the decision."
Accepting the decision may be part of it, but so is being prepared and willing to fight for the scores you believe are deserved.
U.S. gymnast Jordyn Wieber's coach told Sports Illustrated that he kept a filled-out inquiry form with him, just in case.
But as Raisman, Brestyan, Ponor, Uchimura, Shin and others know: It's an imperfect two-sided coin. You have to know when to make the call and be able to do it quickly in gymnastics, and sometimes you just fall on the wrong side of the ruling.
"I agree with the system," Brestyan said, according to Sports Illustrated. "The system sometimes helps. Sometimes not."
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
How far away are we from computerized scoring for these? You think it wouldn't be that far out of the realm to have a computer watch and precicely calculate the speed, angels, hight, moves, etc.
Improving objectivity will never happen with a computer.
Even the best computers still need to be programmed, and that programming will result in objective calls made based on subjective criteria. From there, one of two things will happen: either the subjective criteria will be kept proprietary (in which case people will howl at the arbitrariness of standards), or they will be made open to the public (in which case nobody will ever completely agree on whether or not a set of standards is reasonable). Regardless, the winners will be those who can "game" the standards, rather than the most truly talented athlete.
Look no further than the BCS for an example of how computerized scoring only made matters worse.
The only way to end the problem is to discontinue Olympic events that rely solely on third-party judgments.
as an official myself i full on disagree with the use of computers for scoring, the whole spirit of sports come from the fact that no one is perfect including the officials
I was thinking just the same, like the have the precision for swimmers and runners, they should have a computer take care of gymnastics scoring, I believe the technology already exist.
I think peope are forgetting just how many events are judged. if you think about it, any sport with a referee has some degree of subjectivity, so now your kicking out basketball, soccer, water polo, boxing, volleyball, etc. aka almost every team sport in the olympics.
Why is it only called a judges fail when it benefits Americans? This article wasn't posted until the judged "failed" with one of our athletes.
Charles, In my opinion you make an unfair critique. Perhaps articles were written in the other countries that experienced their own athletes' "judges' failings". Have you checked their media?
Because we expect the best.
Well, CNN is an AMERICAN organization now, isn't it...
**** Charles
Why is it only called a judges fail when it benefits Americans? This article wasn't posted until the judged "failed" with one of our athletes.
---------------------------------------------------
You didnt read the story very well moron.
Aly Raisman already had this happen to her, and she lost the apeal landing in 4th place.
Same thing happened this time only they contested it and won.
This could have happened to any athelete from any country.
Takes a jerk like you to make it about Americans.
I feel bad for the Romanian girl who lost her medal.
Should have given them both a "bronz".
There has been no lack of judicial failure in these Games, and it has nothing to do with whether your country sides with the winner or the loser.
Because CNN is an American news outlet? It's not really news to Americans unless it involves or affects Americans, and CNN has to select its articles based on what's going to get clicks. Clicks drive ad revenue.
because an american wrote it, 80% of our coverage involves american athletes
I guess you missed the whole part in the article about the South Korean athlete? There was even a picture of her sobbing.
Don't blame America. Blame CNN. America doesn't control CNN. CNN is regularly held in contempt by Americans for many things, so go slam CNN, not America.
You can throw in the ref from the Canada/US women's soccer game into this mix as well.
In the Korean fencer's case, the clock may have failed, but time had clearly run out and there should be no judgment. There was a British cyclist who openly admitted that he had purposely crashed his bike in order to get a restart, because his team had a bad start. Yet he was not disqualified. Other contestants also used the system to their advantage, like the Chinese badmington team, and were disqualified.
It's not failure of judgment. It's favoritism and corruption.
Hmmm....not a word about the Norwegian referee that practically GIVES the American womens' soccer team the win over Canada – for a totally BS call in extra time?
No, not a word on that. Then you'd also have to address the ref missing Melissa Tancredi stomping on Carli Lloyd's head, and Canada as a whole seems to want to ignore that as it doesn't help them make their "we were robbed" argument.
The ref in the USA/Canada match let those two play. On the ensuing shot within the box, two canadian players MOVED towards the ball before it was kicked, and it hit two players hands. Learn the rules of soccer before you gripe about calls. If the handball wasn't a foul, moving to the ball BEFORE the ball was kicked WAS a penalty as it happened with the box.
for all the time it took for the judging, in my head i thought immediately...bias. for all the gymnastics i've watched this week the time it took to judge her routine was way too long and i am happy to see her coach take the initiative to question the validity of the score!!! once again it pays to pitch a b!!!tch!!!
Bronze or not, I'd still tap that!
They should not be required to pay a $300 filing feel. That's ridiculous.
(1) make judged sports as objective as possible to smoke out favoritism subjective judging permits. (2) permit reviews of objective elements only – e.g., was it a double flip or a triple flip. and (3) enjoy viewing, knowing that the system is imperfect by better than any others available
That Korean in the picture is making one ugly face, geeesss!!! fugly.
That's just her "O" face!
I'd be making that face, too, if I'd just been cheated out of a gold medal.
wouldnt you if you just lost in the OLYMPICS
There is no crying in the Olympics!!
I don't like it that the article is written with extreme bias towards the US. How come there was't an article like this till a judge's ruling changed the decision in favor or US? This is supposed to be an even that brings the world together.. and there is no race to show who is the biggest jingoist.
Article came up now because it was the second time in "THIS OLYMPIC" that this has
happened.
And it happened to the same girl "Aly Raisman".
The first time she lost and came in fourth.
This time they protsested and it was overturned.
She came in third.
This isnt about "Americans" this is about
"judging" and rules.
Idiot.
So if a Somalian has to go through this, and $300 is over a years work for the person, the money suddenly becomes an issue. Weird that you have to pay to get a review.
Wow, corruption and favortism in olympic judging, who would have thought?
All olympic subjective sports are corrupt. Anything that doesn't have a set guide line for a score (a person that crosses the finish line first, the team that scores more baskets, the person that swims faster) is corrupt.