Olympic figure skater Ashley Wagner slams Sochi judges for "unfairly" scoring other competitors who did not execute their routines perfectly.
According to Yahoo! Sports, the 22-year-old American skater felt "gypped" by judges after she performed two free skating routines without falling on the ice. Wagner came in seventh, two spots behind Julia Lipnitskaia, who fell during both of her programs. Gracie Gold, who placed fourth, fell during her program on Thursday.
"People don't want to watch a sport where you see people fall down and somehow score above someone who goes clean," she said. "It is confusing and we need to make it clear for you."
"To be completely honest, this sport needs fans and needs people who want to watch it. People do not want to watch a sport where they see someone skate lights out and they can't depend on that person to be the one who pulls through. People need to be held accountable."
Lipnitskaia was the favored to win the gold medal for Russia. Wagener told Yahoo! Sports the Olympics needs to change the way they score performances.
"They need to get rid of the anonymous judging," Wagner said. "There are many changes that need to come to this sport if we want a fan base, because you can't depend on this sport to always be there when you need it. The sport in general needs to become more dependable."
Wagner is added she understood what she was getting into at Sochi, but suspected there may have been favoritism, according Yahoo!.
"I came into this event knowing pretty well that that was how it was going to go," she said. "It is not fair to the skaters who work so hard to become noticed if they are not going to have a sport that backs up what they are doing."
A petition was started on Change.org, calling for an open investigation into judging decisions of Women's Figure Skating medal holders. The petition already has 1,651,049 supporters.
