Why US disqualified in mixed relay short track speedskating | king5.com
WASHINGTON — It looked like the United States was going to have a good shot at earning a medal in the Olympic debut of mixed relay short track speedskating, until a costly penalty knocked them out of contention in the semi-finals.
The frantic event features four skaters per team covering 18 laps. Each skater races twice in the following order: woman, woman, man, man, woman, woman, man, man.
During the second semi-final race on Saturday, the U.S. crossed the line second and appeared to secure a spot in the gold medal race.
However, after a lengthy video review the official decided the United States would be penalized because of "blocking by infield skater" and the Russian Olympic Committee would be penalized because of "extra team skater causing obstruction."
According to USA TODAY's Tom Schad, the U.S. athletes believe they were disqualified because one of their skaters crossed the blue line early, which caused the Chinese team to miss an exchange.
After the race, U.S. speedskater Maame Biney called it "an interesting call for sure," according to Schad.
Those penalties meant that Hungary and China, who had initially finished fourth in the semi-final and missed the cut, would go through to the gold medal race.