USA Gymnastics is set to challenge the controversial decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to strip Jordan Chiles of her bronze medal after it was announced it would be given to Romanian athlete Ana Barbosu instead.
Chiles, 23, had been given the bronze medal - her first ever individual Olympic medal - in the floor final on August 5 after she had originally finished in fifth place based on the judges' scores.
However, USA Gymnastics' coach Cecile Landi had quickly submitted an inquiry into the decision, claiming that Chiles had been scored too low for difficulty, specifically for a leap that involved performing a split in the air while turning 540 degrees.
Her appeal was successful and the judges raised Chiles's score from 13.666 to 13.766, making her take the third-place spot over Barbosu and fellow Romanian gymnast Sabrina Maneca-Voinea, who both scored 13.700.
The Romanian Olympic committee had appealed the decision one day later, and it was confirmed on Saturday that a CAS judge had ruled that Landi had submitted her initial inquiry within 1 minute and 4 seconds - which was four seconds too late for it to count.
However, USA Gymnastics is set to challenge the decision, claiming it has proof that the inquiry was submitted within the tight time frame,
According to a statement shared by the organization on Sunday, Landi had submitted the inquiry to change Chiles’s score 47 seconds after it was posted - not 64 seconds later as it was claimed.
It submitted a letter and video evidence to the CAS and called for the bronze medal to be returned to Chiles after she was forced to return it.
Their statement added: "The time-stamped, video evidence submitted by USA Gymnastics Sunday evening shows Landi first stated her request to file an inquiry at the inquiry table 47 seconds after the score is posted, followed by a second statement 55 seconds after the score was originally posted.
"The video footage provided was not available to USA Gymnastics prior to the tribunal’s decision and thus USAG did not have the opportunity to previously submit it."
The controversial decision to strip Chiles of her medal - for which she'd shared the podium with Brazilian gold medalist Rebeca Andrade, and Team USA teammate Simone Biles who took silver - had been condemned by her teammates.
Biles and Sunisa Lee had shared statements in support of Chiles, while her sister, Jazmin, added on Instagram: "They have officially, 5 days later, stripped her of one of her medals.
"Not because she didn’t win, not because she was drugged, not because she stepped out of bounds. Not because she wasn’t good enough.
"But because the judges failed to give her difficulty [score] and forced an inquiry to be made."
