One day before the 16th anniversary of the Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the final gold medal of the 2022 Beijing Olympics was awarded at last. The U.S. figure skating team, as well as silver-medalist Japan, was invited to Paris for the long-awaited medals ceremony. Two and a half years after the event, they were finally presented their Olympic medals in front of the Eiffel Tower. It was one of the coolest moments of the Paris Games...and it involved Winter Olympians who weren't even competing!
This saga dominated the first week of the 2022 Olympics, and it cast a huge shadow over those Games. As a result of the controversy, the medals ceremony for the figure skating team event wasn't held. The Americans and Japanese went home knowing they were Olympic medalists, but without those medals in their possession. They didn't even know what color they were! It was a truly unprecedented move.
The IOC did promise, however, that the medals would be awarded "in an appropriate setting" once the case was fully adjudicated. The legal process dragged on much longer than anyone expected, but it finally got settled, with Kamila Valiyeva's disqualification standing, the Russians being relegated from gold to bronze, the United States upgraded to gold and Japan moving up from bronze to silver. And the timing actually worked out kind of perfectly. Because it gave them the opportunity to finally present the medals in an absolutely perfect setting.
As a refresher, it was discovered two days after the team competition in Beijing concluded that Valiyeva, who skated both segments of the women's portion in the event, had failed a drug test at the Russian Championships and was provisionally suspended. She was allowed to compete in the women's singles event pending the appeals, with the official results on hold until then. After a lengthy appeals process, the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that she should've been suspended, backdated it to when she failed the test, and disqualified her from the Olympics. At long last, Team USA had closure. And gold medals.
It sounds weird to say it all worked out "perfectly," but in a way, it did. COVID restrictions were still in place during the 2022 Olympics. The only spectators allowed were people who live in China. So, if the medals had been presented in Beijing, it would've been in front of a limited crowd that didn't include the skaters' families or friends. In Paris, they didn't just have their families and friends there. They had thousands of fans from around the world to join in the celebration. It truly was an Olympic moment. And did I mention it was in Paris? In front of the Eiffel Tower?
Those COVID protocols applied to the athletes, too, so the entire U.S. team wouldn't have been able to celebrate together had the medals ceremony taken place in Beijing at the 2022 Olympics, either. Vincent Zhou tested positive and was in quarantine. He would've missed it. That wasn't the case on Wednesday. All nine Americans were on the stage together at the Trocadero, receiving their gold medals as a team. (One of the Japanese skaters was missing, but, otherwise, their whole team was there, too.)
So, even though it was a long and winding road, and a wait that must've felt agonizing, there was a satisfying conclusion to this story. The Olympic gold and silver medalists received their medals at last. It must've been a bittersweet moment. They had to wait so long, but they finally got their due. And they got to do it in Paris, as a team, in front of their family and friends.
You'll notice I only mentioned the gold and silver medalists. What about the bronze? Well, that's still up in the air. Even after removing Valiyeva's points, Russia still had enough to win the bronze by a point over Canada. However, the Canadians argue that the women's portion of the event should've been rescored, moving everybody up a place, which would give them the two points they need to pass Russia. It's a valid point. So, the bronze is still unsettled. Regardless, gold to the United States and silver to Japan won't change.
Even if everything with the bronze was settled, however, it's highly doubtful the Russians would've been invited to the ceremony. They're persona non grata with the IOC at the moment. They have been for several years. The Russian Olympic Committee is currently suspended because of the invasion of Ukraine, and the handful of Russian athletes who were approved to compete in Paris have to do so as "Independent Neutral Athletes" without a flag or any sort of national imagery. They weren't even allowed to participate in the Opening Ceremony.
Prior to its current suspension, of course, Russia was suspended by the IOC because of its doping non-compliance. Since hosting the 2014 Sochi Games, the country has been called three different names at the Olympics. They were "Russia" in 2016, "Olympic Athletes from Russia" in 2018, and "ROC" (Russian Olympic Committee) in both Tokyo and Beijing. And, while the doping suspension is technically over, they aren't in Paris (although, if we want to count "Independent Neutral Athletes" as a fourth name for the Russian Olympians, we can) and likely won't be in Milan-Cortina, either.
While the figure skating saga in Beijing is the most recent example, Russia's shoddy doping history has resulted in far too many disqualifications and medal reallocations years after the fact. Some of those situations will also be rectified in Paris.
Lashinda Demus, who originally finished second in the women's 400 hurdles at the London Games, was retroactively awarded the gold after the Russian who finished in front of her was DQed. She'll receive her gold medal in a ceremony of her own at the Trocadero. So will Erik Kynard, who, likewise, saw his London silver in the men's high jump upgraded to a gold.
Will it be as bittersweet for them as it was for the figure skaters? I'm sure. They've had to wait years for a moment that was stolen from them. But, they are getting that moment. And that's the important thing. Even though it's years after the fact, their medals are coming home to their rightful place. And good on the IOC to make the best of a bad situation by having these medal ceremonies at an Olympics, where the athletes can enjoy it with the world, just as they would have had it happened when it was supposed to.
That's why Wednesday's medal ceremony, which didn't even involve Summer Olympians, will go down as one of my favorite moments of the Paris Games. The 2022 U.S. figure skating team finally got its moment. Karen Chen, Nathan Chen, Vincent Zhou, Alexa Kneirim, Brandon Frazier, Madison Hubbell, Zach Donohue, Madison Chock and Evan Bates received their Olympic gold medals at long last.
No comments:
Post a Comment