Jordan Chiles is refusing to let her Olympic bronze medal heartbreak get her down heading into 2025 after showing off her team gold on social media.
The Team USA gymnast was controversially stripped of her individual bronze in the floor exercise at this summer’s Paris Games after a dispute involving Romania’s Ana Barbosu.
After initially landing in fifth place, an appeal from the United States increased Chiles’ score by a tenth, moving her up to third behind Brazil’s Rebeca Andrade and teammate Simone Biles.
But days after the Olympics, that changed when the Romanian athletics commission itself filed an appeal against the scores that knocked Barbosu off the medal tally.
The appeal found that the United States’ original challenge to the scores was filed four seconds late and was invalid, meaning Chiles was deprived of her coveted bronze medal.
In an Instagram post on New Year’s Eve, the 23-year-old shared another Team USA photo of her posing next to the gold medal she won in the team final alongside the likes of Biles and Suni Lee.
Jordan Chiles refuses to let her Olympic bronze medal heartbreak bring her down
The Team USA gymnast showed off her team gold in an Instagram post on New Year’s Eve
In September, Chiles filed an appeal with a Swiss court in an attempt to get back the bronze she won in Paris.
Team USA initially attempted to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport after being stripped of her medal, saying it found video evidence that their appeal was filed 47 seconds after Chiles’ first score was posted on the day. The CAS refused to reopen the case.
The CAS is headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, and appeals in each case go directly to the country’s Supreme Court.
In her appeal, Chiles argued that her ‘right to be heard’ was violated when the CAS refused to consider new evidence. The appeal also alleges that the chairman of the CAS panel had a conflict of interest due to previous legal ties in Romania.
The call was supported by both USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. In a statement, USA Gymnastics said it made a “collective, strategic decision to have Jordan lead the initial submission.” USAG is working closely with Jordan and her legal team and will submit supporting documents to the court in the continued pursuit of justice for Jordan.”
The Oregon-born athlete said in a social media post at the time that her situation “feels unfair” and added that she had been the subject of “unsolicited, racially driven attacks on social media.”