by Kevin Lee

Created on: September 13, 2009

The world of gymnastics is surprisingly marred in scandal and controversy. Here are a few of the more notable incidents.

1998 Seoul Olympics

The American team was set to take third place in the all-around team medals. However, the team received a .5 point reduction because Rhonda Faehn, a team alternate had been on the competition floor while another American was competing. This mere reduction dropped the Americans out of the bronze medal and into fourth. American officials appealed based on the obscurity of the rule and the obvious impact it had but to no avail.

1992 Barcelona Olympics

In the female all-around event, Tatiana Gutsu from the Soviet team barely edged out American Shannon Miller by a mere 0.012 points. The controversy is fueled by Gutsu's errors in the floor routine compared to Miller's flawless day. Gutsu did not even qualify for the Soviet team because of a fall off the balance beam at the qualifiers. Team officials who thought that Gutsu had a good chance for gold made a teammate forfeit her position by citing a knee injury. Nevertheless, Gutsu had always been one of the favourites and performed far more difficult sets than Miller.

2000 Sydney Olympics

American Vanessa Atler was a star of the US gymnastics team. She was a world class vaulter and tumbler who could hit the higher difficulties. However by the time the 2000 Olympics rolled around Atler was left off the team. The primary reason for this was because the team was now selected by a committee rather than the top scores (which would have put Atler on the team). Atler didn't help her case however by having a disastrous season preceding the Olympics. Atler was 4th at the 2000 Nationals and had falls in the vault and floor exercise at the Olympic trials. Atler retired from gymnastics soon afterwards.

During the Olympics there was some controversy with the women's vault. Halfway through the competition, it was discovered that the vault was 5 cm lower than it should have. Olympic favourite Svetlana Khorkina had fallen earlier when the vault was on the wrong height and then fell off the uneven bars. Gymnasts in Khorkina's circumstances were allowed to attempt the vault again but many had already had the hopes for the all-around event dashed.

The medals at the 2000 Olympics were also marred with scandal. The three medals in the women's all-around event were Romanian with Andreea Raducan winning the gold. Raducan's celebration was cut short when she tested positive for pseudoephedrine. The Romanian team stated that it was from the cold medicine that he had given to her and silver medalist Simona Amanar. Raducan was only 82 lbs and the dose may have been big enough for the positive test. Nevertheless, Raducan was stripped of her all-around gold because of the Olympic's zero-tolerance drug policy. Raducan kept her other medals because she had tested clean for those events. Years later, ephedrine would be removed from the banned substances list because it has no performance improving benefits.

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