Jordan Chiles earned her first individual Olympic medal in thrilling fashion, with her coach requesting a review that clinched her bronze medal finish.
Gina Chiles would have been happy either way.
Whether the inquiry submitted by Jordan Chiles’ coach would move her onto the podium or keep her in fifth place during the floor exercise final on Monday, Gina was already proud. In the stands at Bercy Arena, she kept showering applause. Then she saw the standings reset.
Her daughter was an Olympic bronze medalist.
“If I could tell the sounds that will be ingrained in my ears of the roar and cheer of everyone from every country and then seeing Jordan just overjoyed — it’s just unbelievable,” Gina said. “We ugly cried, we cheered, we screamed, it’s just amazing.”
Jordan won her first individual Olympic medal Monday at Bercy Arena in dramatic fashion, stepping up as the final competitor of a long 10 days of the Olympic artistic gymnastics program and doing just enough — upon review — to cap her long-awaited redemption arc.
Initially Gina wasn’t sure if Jordan had done enough to eclipse Romania’s Ana Barbosu and Sabrina Maneca-Voinea, who were tied in the bronze medal position with scores of 13.700. She had bounced up on her first landing and landed short on her last, needing to take a step forward to steady herself. The two-time NCAA champion at UCLA was initially in fifth place with a mark of 13.666.
But Cecile Landi noticed a lower-than-normal difficulty score.
