Newz Forum: OLYMPICS: South Koreans wanted extra gymnastics gold

ATHENS, Greece - The International Olympic Committee rejected South Korea's request to have a duplicate gold medals awarded in men's all-around gymnastics because of a scoring mistake that gave the title to American Paul Hamm, IOC president Jacques Rogge said.

The IOC also turned down an official German petition for duplicate gold medals following a judging error in the three-day equestrian competition.

"We are not going to give medals for so-called humanitarian or emotional reasons," Rogge said Friday at a breakfast meeting with reporters.

Rogge said the IOC will consult with international sports federations to see how judging and scoring can be improved, and that gymnastics has already agreed to revise its rules.

Hamm won the gold last week after judges incorrectly scored Yang Tae-young's parallel bars routine, failing to give the South Korean enough points for the level of difficulty. Yang ended up with the bronze but would have won the competition if the scoring had been correct.

The international gymnastics federation, known as FIG, apologized for the mistake and suspended three judges, but said it couldn't change the results under its rules.

Hamm had said in an interview that he might have deserved to start a tenth higher, but he had changed his grips to much and slipped a couple of times which owuld have deducted his points by 2 tenths

As I said in an earlier thread, it's a shame that Hamm's gold medal will always have an asterick beside it.