Jacques Rogge interview in today's NY Times

[rack]

There's a long interview with Dr. Rogge in a piece written by George Vecsey for the sports section. Since only a couple of paragraphs deal with skating, I figure I can quote them in full:

But he (Rogge) did express one regret from his first (Olympic) games: rushing to award duplicate gold medals to the Canadian skaters after hearing the charges of pressure from the woman known forever as the French Judge.

"I wanted to make it right for the athletes, but I should have been more proactive," Rogge said, meaning he should have consulted Russian officials first, to insist his action did not cheapen the gold medals awarded to the Russian pair.

"I admit my errors," Rogge said.

[Charis]

Originally posted by rack
...but I should have been more proactive," Rogge said, meaning he should have consulted Russian officials first, to insist his action did not cheapen the gold medals awarded to the Russian pair.

"I admit my errors," Rogge said.

SPARE ME! Cheapen their gold medals, indeed!

And what would he have done if the Russians said, "No way!" which they surely would have...

IMO, it was an error, but more unfair to J&D than B&S. It was a quickie, band-aid solution. The only right and fair thing to do would be to declare the competition null and void and hold it over again.

However, I think J&D were lucky to have even gotten this small amount of justice and would not have, if it weren't for the media.

Bravo, Scott & Sandra!

[adrianchew]

Link to online article...

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/07/sports/othersports/07VECS.html

[icenut84]

Originally posted by Charis
SPARE ME! Cheapen their gold medals, indeed!

Well, yeah... they were no longer Olympic champions in their own right, they were joint Olympic champions. That's why he said that.

And what would he have done if the Russians said, "No way!" which they surely would have...

Maybe he and the IOC would have done a more thorough, and longer-lasting, investigation in order to find out exactly what happened, rather than bowing to pressure by awarding the second golds only a few days later (or however long it was).

IMO, it was an error, but more unfair to J&D than B&S. It was a quickie, band-aid solution. The only right and fair thing to do would be to declare the competition null and void and hold it over again.

I thought that at first too, but now I don't think it would be fair to anyone to hold the competition again. If S&P made a mistake during the repeat competition and B&S were flawless, would you agree with it? I doubt S&P would either. And even if everyone agreed that they would accept the new results whatever happened, it wouldn't be fair on the other competitors in the competition, such as S&Z, who had skated last and so had known what everyone else had done - it affects someone's performance. S&Z went for the quad throw and almost made it but made a mistake - if S&P and B&S had both splatted, they might not have risked it. Does that make any sense? If there was going to be new judging, it would probably be fairer to judge from videos of the performances on the night, but again, videos aren't the same as live.

[LTM]

I often wonder if it would have been better to have just nullified the pairs results and have that record as the outcome of the 02 Olympics.
Yeh, horribly unfair to the athletes but just maybe that would have been the smack up the side of the head the various skating feds might have
paid attention to.

[Emilieanne]

We still have a long way to go this season, and don't yet count Dr. Rogge and the IOC out for this year just yet. The 115th Session meets in Prague this July 2-7. By that time the IOC can honestly say that it had given the ISU the opportunity to clean up the mess. We all know that the ISU did no such thing and I do not believe for one New York minute that the IOC is fooled by the "smokescreen" of the new scoring system that the ISU is promoting as the solution to the problems.

It would not surprise me one bit if the extradition of the "mobster" from Italy and subsequent trial coincided time-wise with Worlds in Washington DC so as to allow for any foreign ISU-o-crats to be subpoenad to testify and escorted to New York to ensure that they appeared in court. I cannot help but wonder what any of them would say...they would be under oath! Then to top it all off, the 115th Session of the IOC takes place in Prague on July 2-7. Depending on what happens with Worlds and any "trial," God only knows what will happen in Prague.

Fasten your seatbelts everyone, no doubt we are in for some turbulence.