OT: China Dong-punched America in 2000 Olympics
So the IOC has announced that they have stripped the Chinese women's gymnastics team of its bronze medal in 2000 in Sydney. Why? Because they had an underage gymnast that competed. The US will now be the recipient of the bronze.
But it's interesting to read that it was a literal Dong punch...
"The International Olympic Committee acted after investigations by the sport’s governing body determined that Dong Fangxiao was only 14 at the 2000 Games. Gymnasts must turn 16 during the Olympic year to be eligible."
http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/news;_ylt=AoapnzstdrW1gzUiRyq99_05nYcB…
That means that Elise Ray, Michigan alum, on that 2000 US team now gets a bronze medal.
give it another 10 years and the IOC/FIG will get their act together...maybe
It seemed quite a stretch that they were all of proper age.
Oh, and U-S-A! U-S-A!
That since it took place a decade ago, no one will really ever remember who won what. Will the atheletes themselves actually feel like they won a medal as they never got on the stand? Just messes with some statistics somewhere but no real world impact.
i had a benjamin on that Olympics - dude owes me money!
It probably does lose some of the impact but if I was a member of a team that finished fourth and later found out that the third place did something illegal, in this case, underaged athletes, I would be so excited to receive the medal. These athletes put a lot of time into their sports so I would think they would be happy with a medal whenever they received it.
Let's hope the NCAA is quicker to act against USC than the IOC was here.
This implies that the NCAA will do anything to the University of Spoiled Children.
They misinterpreted the difference between years of age and "countable years."
Could have happened to anyone.
Didn't you hear? Life starts at the first date between your parents, not conception or birth like all the loonies tell you!
Dog years?
or Dong years?
Now I'm confused!
Why did it take so long to find out how fucking old the kid was? Shouldn't this stuff be double checked before the Olympics even begin?
This is China we are talking about - not exactly a Paragon of transparency.
I thought it was completely transparent the way they produced official documents with fake birthdates on them.
True, but the IOC should probably run a tighter ship in terms of forged documentation. I guess there's no easy way to thwart forgery considering every country has different documentation policies with wildly varying "protections" against counterfeiting, but it's still a bit disheartening that it took them a decade to crack this one open.
Is it really a forgery if it's the Chinese government that is producing these documents?
It's a forgery if the information on said documents isn't true, which it wasn't. Technically, it's an official document, but it's no more legitimate than if someone were to scratch out the date on my birth certificate and write something else in.
A lot of age falsifications are only made apparent after the fact (although Beijing is an exception). The FIG and the IOC don't investigate every single passport for authenticity; Dong would probably never have been investigated if she hadn't applied for a credential with her real birth date. The only other gymnast/country to be persecuted for age falsification was North Korea in the early 1990s, who listed Kim Gwang Suk as being 15 for three years in a row. However there are various other incidents in which people have publicly admitted to being underage during competition such as: Alexandra Marinescu of Romania in the 1996 Olympics, Gina Gogean in the 1992 Olympics, Daniela Silivas of Romania in the 1985 World Championships, and far too many Soviet era gymnasts to name or count.
The FIG and the IOC will have to decide what to do from here, and whether or not they want to go back and completely rewrite the gymnastics history books.
Lumberjack: What's your last name?
Long Duk Dong: Dong.
Lumberjack: What's your first name?
Long Duk Dong: Long.
Lumberjack: What's your middle name?
Long Duk Dong: Duk.
No wonder they were confused...
That reminds me, a guy I worked with in college had a friend named Dong Wang. ...I know, I'm still astonished that such a man exists to this day.
it was about finding the best in a sport. why does her age matter?
April 28th, 2010 at 10:10 PM ^
The age requirement in gymnastics is not to produce a level playing field but to protect the athletes themselves. Young competitors especially girls can cause irreversible damage to their still-growing skeleton and muscular development. It's supposed to prevent coaches from pushing these women too hard at too young an age.
April 28th, 2010 at 11:16 PM ^
Honestly, the age rules are bullshit. Yes they are designed to protect young girls from competing difficult skills, but this is rarely the case at the elite level. Girls are training the most difficult skills in the world as early as 12 or 13; the only thing the age rule does is cause them to have to spend more time in the sport, often beyond their peak as a gymnast, and therefore increasing the number of injuries.
Gymnasts are for more likely to succumb to injury as they age and continue competing, especially women, who tend to peak anywhere from 13 to 20. (Men have less of a steep peak and dropoff and more of a gradual curve during their 20s, but many continue on to their 30s. Theres only one women past 30 still competing today).
Coaches push their gymnasts sometimes, yes, but gymnastics is an extremely competitive sport in which many girls will do whatever in takes, including fighting through injury, in order to perform. There are so many excellent gymnasts who miss out on the Olympics because they are too young by a few months, and then must continue to compete for four more years. It would benefit both the competition of the sport and the health of the girls to lower the age limit back to 14, or possibly 13. However, with this ruling the FIG has clearly stated their position on the matter.
But it's interesting to read that it was a literal Dong punch.
Although her name is Dong, I don't think she literally punched anyone.