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Paul Hamm can keep his Olympic gold medal.
Sports' highest court rejected a South Korean appeal Thursday, ruling that Hamm is the rightful champion in the men's all-around gymnastics competition at the Athens Games.
"This is, obviously, a great day for me," Hamm said. "The decision from CAS confirms what I've always felt in my heart, which is that I was champion that night and Olympic gold medalist."
The decision by a three-judge panel from the Court of Arbitration for Sport ends a saga that began more than two months ago when South Korea's Yang Tae-young claimed a scoring error cost him the title.
Yang asked the court to order international gymnastics officials to change the results, and adjust the medal rankings so he would get the gold and Hamm the silver. But the CAS panel dismissed the appeal, leaving Hamm with the gold and Yang with his bronze. Kim Dae-eun of South Korea was the silver medalist.
The verdict is final and cannot be appealed.
"An error identified with the benefit of hindsight, whether admitted or not, cannot be a ground for reversing a result of a competition," the CAS panel said.
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| Paul Hamm proudly displays his gold medal after learning he won't have to give it back.(AP) |
"We are sorry about the court's decision but accept it," the Koreans said in a statement. "We are sorry that we could not live up to the expectations of the people who have shown concern and encouraged us."
Hamm won the gold Aug. 18, rallying from 12th place with only two events left to become the first American man to win gymnastics' biggest prize. But two days later, gymnastics officials discovered that Yang had been wrongly docked a tenth of a point on his second-to-last routine, the parallel bars.
Yang ended up with the bronze, 0.049 points behind Hamm. Add that extra 0.100, though, and Yang would have finished on top, 0.051 points ahead of the American.
That, however, assumes everything in the final rotation played out the same way -- a big if.
