LOS ANGELES — No one could blame Jordan Chiles at this point for worrying that the International Olympic Committee will barge into her place and pry that infamous bronze medal from her fingers.
Instead, the UCLA junior from Vancouver is reaching new heights literally and figuratively, expertly flying through the air, leading the Bruins to the Big Ten Conference gymnastics championship and a No. 3 national ranking.
Time magazine named her one of the women of the year, she published her memoir “I’m That Girl,” and is featured in Nike’s “So Win” campaign.
All while continuing her fight with the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which stripped Chiles of a bronze medal in the floor exercise at the Paris Olympics after CAS ruled that the U.S. coach’s appeal of her score was made four seconds too late.
Ana Barbosu of Romania vaulted into third place and Chiles, a graduate of Prairie High School, was dropped to fifth even though USA Gymnastics produced a time-stamped video from a Netflix team shooting a documentary about Chiles’ teammate Simone Biles that allegedly proved the protest came within the proper time limit of one minute.
And even though the head of the CAS panel that stripped Chiles of her medal is a lawyer who has represented Romanian interests for years.
Los Angeles Times columnist Bill Plaschke summarized the episode this way: “In the case of Jordan Chiles, they got her final score right. The Romanians didn’t disagree. Nobody disagreed. She earned the points. She earned the medal.
“If this were a competition run by somebody other than a bribe-taking, influence-peddling, over-the-top arrogant organization like the IOC, this wouldn’t be an issue.”
But it was, and still is, an issue.
The organization demanded that Chiles return her bronze medal. She kept it and appealed the CAS ruling to the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland.
Briefs have been submitted by both sides, the most recent salvo coming Monday from Chiles in response to a CAS filing described by Chiles’ lawyers as “improper and newly raised arguments as well as misstatements of fact that seek to misconstrue the record and shift blame to Ms. Chiles.”
Chiles’ brief points out that “CAS falsely asserted that it was ‘undisputed’ that Ms. Chiles’ inquiry was untimely, a fact known by the world to be untrue. In her prior briefs, Ms. Chiles provided conclusive evidence that the inquiry was made within the allotted time.”
CAS earlier had asserted that Chiles didn’t provide sufficient evidence of the timeliness of the inquiry and was late in noting that CAS panel head Hamid G. Gharavi had a conflict of interest because of his extensive work as a lawyer for the Romanian government.
Chiles’ lawyers asserted that any delays were the fault of CAS, which sent all correspondence to Chiles to an invalid email address that indicated to the sender that the emails didn’t reach her.
“Nonetheless, CAS continued to use that email address for multiple days, and numerous communications,” the filing said. “Then, CAS only tried to correct its mistakes after several rounds of briefing had been submitted by the other parties.”
Chiles has remained dedicated to UCLA gymnastics throughout the legal battle, something her coach and teammates appreciate.
“I can’t say enough about the unique person that she is to be able to handle everything on her plate and be able to handle it with so much excellence,” UCLA coach Janelle McDonald said Sunday at Pauley Pavilion. “It inspires me every single day. … She cares so much about the team that throughout it all, she’s figuring out a way to be 100 percent connected and show up for the team each and every day.”
Chiles said she is inspired by her UCLA teammates, which include graduate students Brooklyn Moors, an all-around finalist for Canada in the Tokyo Olympics, and eight-time All-American Chae Campbell.
“I think honestly I see it as being part of such an amazing team,” Chiles said Sunday. “It’s cool to see no matter how much support we give each other, we understand how we all have different paths.”
