Sources at Drake Are Outraged
Over Olympics Skating Decision

By Laura Hanson
CyberNews Staff Reporter

(Insert Date)

In a world of makeup, costumes and picture-perfect performances, the backstage world of figure skating revealed its darker side during the Olympic Games yet again. And Drake University students, along with numerous figure skating fans, were outraged.

"It's unfair and wrong," Nathan Olson, a Drake sophomore, business major said. A debate about scoring in pairs figure skating isn't unusual to the sport, but this year's pairs competition took controversial judging to a new level.

Monday night, Canadians Jamie Sale and David Pelletier skated what appeared to be a flawless program, while their Russian competitors, Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze, completed their program on shaky legs. To the surprise of many people in the crowd and viewers at home, the judges awarded the gold medal to the Russian team. As a result, the world of figure skating was shocked and disturbed.

An informal survey of 50 students at Drake showed 98 percent of the students felt the Canadian team deserved to win the gold medal in pairs figure skating. The other 2 percent thought the Russians deserved it. NBC took a similar poll and found that 96 percent of people agreed the Canadians should have taken the gold.

"I really thought the judges needed to get some bifocals," Olson said, "because it seems like everyone except them saw what really happened."

By last Friday night of the Olympics, the entire figure skating association was in an uproar when the International Skating Union announced the Canadian pairs team would be granted a gold medal due to the controversial judging.

ISU president Ottavio Cinqunata would not comment on the judging except to say the internal scandal would seriously be evalulated at a meeting Monday morning.

"There's always something going on, ever since I can remember," Mary Longseth said. Longseth, the registration coordinator at Drake, is a long-time skating fan and was outraged with the scandal. "It's never been right," she remarked, shaking her head.

The ISU held the double gold medal ceremony Sunday night at the Salt Lake City Ice Center. This time, Sale, Pelletier, Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze all shared the top of the podium as the Canadians were awarded with their gold medals. Both teams had the national anthems played. The bronze medal winners, She Xue and Zhao Hongbo of China, also participated in the ceremony.

"They [the ISU] corrected half of their mistake by giving out two gold medals." Olson said, "but it still doesn't fix things."

This is the fourth time in Olympic history where double medals have been awarded. The other instances were because of technical errors in computation and timing. This is the first time that it was due to a major controversary in judging.