Pushoffs for U.S. Bobsled Team Must Be Held Again, Ruling Says

An arbitrator ruled Saturday in Los Angeles that the U.S. Olympic bobsled team was unfairly selected last year and ordered a new round of tryouts.

Arbitrator Ross R. Hart’s ruling came after a hearing Thursday and Friday with hurdler Edwin Moses and football players Willie Gault and Greg Harrell.

The three claim they weren’t informed of the schedule and regulations of the Olympic trials last July at Lake Placid, N.Y. At the push trial, the team finished second, .01 of a second behind a team of Todd Snavely, Jeff Woodard and Bryan Leturgez. Moses, Gault and Harrell filed a protest with the U.S. Bobsled Federation.

Hart ruled that a series of pushoffs be held between next Tuesday and Saturday in Europe among the eight sledders selected in Lake Placid, the two alternates and Moses, Gault and Harrell.

“While the pushoffs may not result in any change to the currently selected eight push athletes, such a pushoff will give (Moses, Gault and Harrell) an opportunity to make the team,” Hart wrote in his 28-page ruling.