Skating Union Denies Protest by Russians

The International Skating Union on Friday denied the Russian Figure Skating Federation’s protest of the judging in the women’s figure skating competition, leaving Irina Slutskaya with the silver medal and Sarah Hughes of Great Neck, N.Y., with the gold.

The protest, filed by Russian Figure Skating President Valentin Piseev, was based on Tuesday’s short program “where Slutskaya was definitely the best but was still placed second,” and on her presentation scores in Thursday’s long program.

Slutskaya was ranked second in the short program and second again in the long program. She complained after Thursday’s finale that her presentation scores didn’t reflect the effort she had made to improve them.

“In other competitions I have higher marks in the second mark,” said Slutskaya, who was expected to vie for the gold with U.S. champion Michelle Kwan. “They’re always 5.8s and 5.9s [out of 6.0], and here I received 5.6s. I was shocked.”

ISU referee Britta Lindgren denied the protest without comment.

Although Russian Olympic Committee President Leonid Tyagachev said Thursday his country was threatening to pull out of the Games and boycott Sunday’s closing ceremony to protest what it alleges is an anti-Russian bias, Russian President Vladimir V. Putin on Friday said there will be no withdrawal. However, he maintained North American athletes are being favored over Russian athletes.

Russian politicians and sports officials have complained of unfair treatment in cross-country skiing, where the Russian women’s relay team dropped out after leader Larissa Lazutina was banned for having excessively high levels of hemoglobin, as well as in figure skating and men’s hockey.

In an earlier dispute that threatened to overshadow the Games, Russians Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze won the gold medal in pairs skating but later watched as their top rivals, Jamie Sale and David Pelletier of Canada, were given duplicate gold medals after a judging scandal was uncovered.

Russia also complained about biased officiating in the Olympic hockey tournament but did not carry out threats to pull its men’s team from the semifinals. Russia lost to the U.S., 3-2, in a semifinal Friday.

“There’s not much you can do about it right now,” Russian hockey Coach Viacheslav Fetisov said. “An agreement’s been signed that is designed to have a final between Canada and the USA. You have this final, you have NHL referees.... They live here, and they know the North American players.”

Russia isn’t alone in complaining North American athletes have received favored treatment. South Korea earlier this week also threatened to boycott the closing ceremony and protested to the Court of Arbitration for Sport over the disqualification of short-track speedskater Kim Dong-Sung.

Kim finished first in the 1,500-meter race Wednesday night, but American Apolo Anton Ohno was given the gold medal because the referee said Kim blocked Ohno with half a lap to go.

On Friday, Francois Carrard, director general of the IOC, said South Korea had backed off its threat and would attend the Games’ closing show. “Fighting for their position in front of the [Court of Arbitration for Sport] is one thing, but in the Olympic spirit, being there participating in the closing ceremony, of course, is another thing,” Carrard said.

So much for the good news. Although the figure skating competition ended with the women’s competition on Thursday, another protest was filed Friday.

The Lithuanian Skating Federation, rebuffed by the ISU when it protested the judging of the free dance portion of the ice dance competition, took its appeal to the ISU’s executive council.

Lithuania contends its fifth-place duo of Margarita Drobiazko and Povilas Vanagas would have finished higher if the judges had properly penalized the higher-ranking Canadian and Italian couples for falls. Barbara Fusar-Poli and Maurizio Margaglio of Italy won the bronze and Shae-Lynn Bourne and Victor Kraatz of Canada finished fourth.

“It was patently unfair,” John Domanskis, the Lithuanian National Olympic Committee’s attache, said of the judging. “It’s pretty unusual that a small country can get anywhere [with a protest]. It’s like a closed shop. But it becomes more and more obvious something is going on.... The further we can take it, we’re going to try, so we can make a statement and see what we can do for our athletes in the future.”

The ISU put off until April a decision on the fate of suspended French judge Marie Reine Le Gougne, who was at the center of the pairs controversy.

Le Gougne and Didier Gailhaguet, head of the French figure skating federation, were questioned this week about allegations she had been pressured by Gailhaguet to vote for the Russian pair over the Canadians, an approach she did not report to the ISU until after she judged the competition and gave an advantage in the long program to the Russians. Her scores gave them the gold on a 5-4 vote, although Sale and Pelletier later got duplicate gold medals.

Le Gougne has told conflicting stories, saying she was pressured by Gailhaguet and then retracting that claim.