It’s official: the petite Chinese gymnasts did not flout Olympic rules by being too young to participate in the games, which were held in August in Beijing this year.
When team China competed in the games, many suspected that the ages of the gymnasts were falsified. Bela Karolyi, the American coach, was among the issue’s most vocal critics.
"These people think we are stupid," he said. "We are in the business of gymnastics. We know what a kid of 14 or 15 or 16 looks like. What kind of slap in the face is this? They are 12, 14 years old and they get lined up and the government backs them and the federation runs away. There is an age limit and it can’t be controlled."
Bloggers online generally agreed, noting inconsistencies in news reports. For example, blogger Gateway Pundit gave evidence of China "scrubbing the Internet."
He noted that in an original China Daily article, an athlete’s age was listed as 14. But a revised article now reads that she was 16.
As a result, a team was put together to investigate the allegations. And after six weeks, they ruled that the Chinese had not cheated in the Games, citing documentation submitted by the country.
The passports, IDs and family registers of He Kexin, Yang Yilin, Jiang Yuyuan, Deng Linlin and Li Shanshan all showed that they turn sixteen this year. China provided the evidence.
FIG secretary general Andre Gueisbuhler told Associated Press hinted at the helplessness of the federation to disqualify the girls if China isn’t truthful.
"We have received all we could possibly ask for. All of them confirm the age that they should be, so what can we do ?" he asked.
China’s head coach, Huang Yubin, has also vehemently defended his gymnasts, saying that Asian girls "have different figures than people from the West," and that "they shouldn’t be suspicious."
Age-tweaking is not uncommon in gymnastic competitions as girls who are smaller tend to be more flexible and agile then their older counterparts. Countries like N Korea and Russia have been discovered to cheat this way before.