U.S. Olympic figure skaters receive gold medals in Paris after 912-day delay

PARIS — With the Eiffel Tower presiding over a crowd of thousands and “The Star-Spangled Banner” ringing out on a perfect August day in the French capital, nine American Olympians finally got their reward for something they did 912 days ago and 5,000 miles away.

The 2022 U.S. Olympic figure skaters had to wait 2 1/2 years to the day to get their gold medals for the team event at the Beijing Games, but at least the venue was well worth the delay.

“I didn’t know what to expect when I walked out there,” Karen Chen said of the view. “It was just … I’m speechless, I don’t know. It’s extremely special.”

Chen and her eight teammates from that 2022 team — Nathan Chen, Vincent Zhou, Alexa Knierim, Brandon Frazier, Madison Hubbell, Zachary Donohue, Madison Chock and Evan Bates — were all in Paris for Wednesday’s ceremony, which was delayed for more than two years because the circumstances around their ascent to gold were under review in court.

At the team event at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, Russia cruised to what appeared to be a nine-point win and a gold medal. The United States finished second, with Japan in bronze medal position.

However, the medal ceremony, scheduled for the next day, was postponed because IOC spokesperson Mark Adams said it involved a “legal consultation” with the International Skating Union.

Reports soon followed that star Russian skater Kamila Valieva, 15 years old at the time, had tested positive six weeks earlier for trimetazidine (TMZ), a medicine that can improve blood flow to the heart and is on the World Anti-Doping Agency’s banned substance list. The case was pending for two years, with no medals being awarded in the meantime before the Court of Arbitration for Sport sided with WADA and handed down a four-year ban to Valieva in January.

That decision cleared the way for the IOC to disqualify her results in Beijing, which bumped Russia down to bronze and made the United States the gold medal winner. The Americans knew for months that the gold was theirs; Wednesday’s medal ceremony — which also honored Japan, the now the silver medalists — was the last formal step.

“That’s what we were fighting for,” Chen said. “We really wanted to have a moment. That’s what we didn’t get at Beijing. And so, to get this moment here, it’s such a great moment for us.”

Valieva’s ban was retroactive to December 2021, so she will be eligible to compete in the 2026 Olympics, though perhaps only individually. The IOC did not allow Russia to compete in team events in Paris due to their ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and only approved Russian and Belarussian athletes could compete under the label “Individual Neutral Athletes.”

Several Americans spoke Wednesday of the ongoing fight to keep the sport clean.

“It really symbolizes the value of clean sport,” Chock, an ice dancer on the 2022 team, said, “and I think this is a win for clean athletes everywhere, to show that there is justice and due process.”

Much has changed since the Beijing Olympics for this group. Some have retired. Zhou, a singles skater, enrolled at Brown. Chock and Bates, partners on the ice, got married in June. Hubbell, an ice dancer, also got married last year and had a daughter in February. But they all came back together for a long-overdue celebration.

“Our team has been very resilient and strong throughout the wait,” Bates said. “We feel grateful to have a real Olympic ceremony with the national anthem and our entire team here.”

Said Chock: “I could have never imagined a better setting. To get our Winter Olympic medal at the Summer Olympics is something I could’ve never dreamed of.”

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(Photo: Michael Reaves / Getty Images)