Legally Bond
Legally Bond
Bond in Paris, Part Four
In this special summer series of Legally Bond, Kim talks with Bond higher education and Title IX attorney and Olympic Gold Medalist Kristen Thorsness. Kris traveled to the 2024 Paris Olympics as part of the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) Ad Hoc Division. Part four, and the conclusion of this series, is a discussion of the arbitrations Kris oversaw and her overall experience in Paris.
For the CAS decisions discussed in the episode, click below:
Weightlifting
Water Polo
Swimming
Track & Field
Hello and welcome to Legally Bond, a podcast presented by the law firm Bond Cheneck King. I'm your host, kim Wolfe-Price. Today we have the fourth and final installment of our special summer series, one that celebrates the nexus between the law and sport and, in particular, the Olympic Games. Kristen Thorsness again joins us as our guest, this time coming home from the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. As a reminder, chris is an up-counsel in Bonn's Rochester office, practicing in the area of higher education and particularly Title IX, which is part of the Education Act. Chris is an Olympic gold medalist and, having just returned home from the Games, she was serving in a very unique role there, so we're here to talk about that. Well, first, Chris, thanks for joining us again. Welcome home.
Speaker 2:Happy to be here.
Speaker 1:I'm sure it's very nice to be home. We all think it's glamorous to live in a hotel for a long time but turns out it's not that glamorous, is it?
Speaker 2:No, you know, you can't just go to the refrigerator whenever you're hungry and there's somebody coming to clean your room every day, which is kind of nice, but at the same time then stuff gets moved and it's really nice to be home.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good. Well, we're very glad you're back. I hope that the trip back was good Piece of cake.
Speaker 2:I went to the airport very, very, very early to avoid the big crowds and that worked out really well.
Speaker 1:Did you leave right after the closing ceremonies, like within a day or two? Yeah, I was on a plane the next morning, wow, okay, so there were definitely crowds going to the airport. Well, there were yes, oh my gosh. So the work you were doing in Paris with CAS as it's referred to, and it's critical to the civil functioning and sort of fairness of sport competition in the Olympics, will you please remind everyone what CAS is?
Speaker 2:Sure. Cas stands for the Court of Arbitration for Sport. It was originally created by the International Olympic Committee but is a freestanding entity, and it provides a relatively efficient and quick venue for resolution of sporting disputes. In addition to the day-to-day workings of CAST with a variety of professional and amateur sport entities around the world, including all of the Olympic family, all of the anti-doping agencies, we also do a lot of work with FIFA and a number of other kinds of sporting leagues. A lot of work with FIFA and a number of other kinds of sporting leagues. Every four years, cast lends a dozen or so arbitrators to the IOC, and so that we have a group of arbitrators on the ground at the Olympics ready to jump into action at a moment's notice. When disputes arise, and particularly during the period of competition, there's a need for very quick turnaround, oftentimes, sometimes a matter of hours, and so we're there to jump in as needed.
Speaker 1:That can be a matter of hours, because the next round is happening like several hours from now, right? So that's why it has to be quick.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah, absolutely. That happened to me this time, one of my cases. I got a call in the middle of breakfast at about 9.15, and the next game in this sport was at 1 o'clock, and so you know we had to have a decision before that, and so things moved very quickly.
Speaker 1:That's wild. So your role in Paris this year, unlike when you were an athlete at the Summer Games, was to be an arbitrator and serve on these panels. Is that correct?
Speaker 2:That's right. That's right. It was great to have a completely different perspective on the Games from what I had experienced previously. Yeah, and I would sit either as a member of a panel or as a sole arbitrator. Actually, three of my four cases I sat as a sole arbitrator, which is a whole other experience in itself.
Speaker 1:Yes, exactly, you don't have the other. It's usually panels of three, did you say?
Speaker 2:Usually, yeah, we have panels of three.
Speaker 1:Three, so by yourself, you're doing all of it, including giving the instructions and then the final decision.
Speaker 2:That's right. That's right. Cas had brought some of its staff attorneys to Paris as well, and so I had that support. I had some people I could talk to and bounce ideas off, and then, of course, everything went through my supervisor, who wouldn't tell me how to rule, but we could talk about issues of law and CASS jurisprudence and precedent and procedure and things like that, which was great to have that kind of institutional memory and, just you know, somebody to bounce things off of.
Speaker 1:This must have been really fun, because not only was it the excitement of something that you've devoted a lot of your life to, which is right sport, olympic competition, competition at that highest level but also the other one of the other major things you've devoted your life to, which is the law and figuring out problems and problem solving and getting to the nitty gritty and the facts like you got to actually really be at the highest level in both.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm a nerd and this enabled me to be a sporting nerd, and you know, to dig into the rules and dig into the facts and, and you know, and that's really what we're there to do is to ascertain the facts and then apply them to the rules. You know, and the outcome is not always something that we're really happy about, because we you know, particularly me, but I think all of the arbitrators feel very strongly about the athletes and about you know what the work that they've put in and you know the dreams that go into getting close to or at the Olympic Games, and so this decision-making process is not something that any of us took lightly at all. And you know, we would sit around in the evenings and kind of talk about kind of depressurize from that process of you know, because we all had to make rulings that we weren't happy about but the facts of the law required it.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think that's a good point you said depressurize. You know sports, whatever sport it is, there's a passion from the athletes, the viewers, the supporters. So it's big and it's intense in a way that sometimes a contract dispute or other thing doesn't have that same level of outside energy to it. So that must have been something you had to deal with as well, or you and your colleagues, this sort of outside voices trying to get through.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we operate on oftentimes a very short time frame. You know, standard litigation takes years. This takes a day or two. And also this is not just a commercial dispute where it's big corporations throwing money around. These are people who've trained for years, who have put the rest of their lives on hold, have dedicated themselves to coming to the Olympic Games, which is there's a lot of idealism there for the athletes, so that it makes it all that much more personal, because you're dealing with real people, athletes who've put their bodies on the line literally for this dream to go to the Olympics, and sometimes we have to decide whether or not they get to do that.
Speaker 1:Right, that's a lot, and you know what I have to say, probably because of our conversation. So I've been paying attention not just to watching the events, but paying attention to the other things that are happening and some, some of the rulings and the decisions, but it never really occurred to me how different the set of very strict rules for each sport is. It's time, it's weight, it's like whether the ball's the right weight or whether, like, the equipment in the boat is probably connected correctly, right, like all of that. So each time you have to learn a little bit something different, don't you?
Speaker 2:I had four cases with four different sports, so I had to learn four different sets of rules in some sports that I wasn't really familiar with, necessarily. And then, of course, there's all of the Olympic charter and all of the qualification rules for the Paris Olympics, which is what they call, kind of what we call a complaint, and just dive right into it, looking at what are the allegations, what are the rules that they're citing, what other rules can apply here, and while I'm waiting for the respondents' briefs to come in, which I will then read and digest quickly and look at the rules that they've cited and the case law or the CAS jurisprudence, that's on point, and I'm working with staff attorneys at CAS who are helping me to collect information and relevant citations, all on a very quick timeline.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so there's for the sport, right, there's whether CAS is arbitrating and you all the panels, are making decisions based on the rules, whatever the question or appeal is, and the rules for the sport as they were implemented, and I suppose sometimes it can be for sport generally, right, the more overarching. What was it? Are you living up to the Olympic ideals? Is that also something that can come into play or is it always individualized by the sport?
Speaker 2:It's usually it's generally individualized by the sport. But the Olympic charter comes into play. For instance, if there's jurisdictional challenges Okay, saying you know this isn't an appealable issue, or CAS doesn't have the jurisdiction to hear this issue, then we start looking in the more broad overarching concepts in the Olympic Charter and things like that.
Speaker 1:Gotcha, and I don't want to sound like a loner here, but the rules for sport are created for fairness, for competition and for civility and safety, so oh dictability.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know everybody knows what's expected of them and everyone else. So that you know we have a common framework that everybody operates under. And you know and these people are this is not their first rodeo. You know, these coaches and these athletes are very familiar with the rules that apply to what they're doing, so it's not really a surprise to anybody, and that's one of the reasons why we have the rules is so everybody understands what's expected of them.
Speaker 1:Right, it's like why we have, you know, laws, civil society and this is, but these are the expectations and it's the same concept, but in the venue for sports.
Speaker 2:Right, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it must have been so interesting to have to learn. You know right, so you're a rower, right? That's what your sport is, that's what you've been committed to US rowing for a long time, but to learn these different rules, it must have been really interesting. But to learn these different rules.
Speaker 2:it must have been really interesting. It really was. It really was. My cases had to do with track and field, swimming, water polo and weightlifting, and so I learned a lot about these sports that I haven't had a whole lot of contact with. It's sort of a particular narrow this is this issue kind of thing. But what was interesting too was to was to sit on some of these cases and then go watch the sport. Like I I, you know, I sat on this weightlifting case and then I went over to watch weightlifting one day and to just kind of take, take part in that and feel the feel, the energy of the venue, which was real cool.
Speaker 2:Weightlifting is such a dramatic sport, you know a lot of grunting in my Well and they get the weight partway up and they're struggling and they're struggling and I'm sitting in my seat doing all kinds of body language trying to get them up, and everybody else in the room is too, and when they succeed and they get their arms locked out, everybody's cheering like crazy. And it was exactly what the Olympics is about. It was wonderful.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic. I think it's so great that you got to learn about other sports and, you know, engage in that way and you could be, you know, have such an important role, but also go and enjoy as an extra knowledgeable spectator.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, when I wasn't working, I was able to go to venues and watch other sports, and that's always exciting at the Olympics, you know, because it's even if you don't really understand the nature of the sport. It's being done at the highest level and that's obvious, so that you can really appreciate that these people that are doing this are the best in the world at it. And that's cool to watch, even if I don't really understand the off-sides rule, which I never really will. But I can appreciate that what's happening here is being done by the best people at it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's really really fantastic. I mean, it's just the energy in the city must have been just, I don't know, electric.
Speaker 2:It really was. And unfair or fair. Parisians have this reputation of being kind of rude, right, but I don't know if all the rude people left town or what, but everybody was so nice and and I think even the Parisians were enjoying it and and there was this wonderful energy and they, they had thousands of volunteers out and around the city. So you know, if you needed something, if you needed directions, if you were lost, if you needed to figure out which gate to go into at a particular venue, they were there to help you. They were friendly, they were really eager to help.
Speaker 2:And the police there was a very significant police and military presence. But even the police seemed to be in a good mood. And you know, I had I got lost a couple of times or needed help. You know, talking to my cab driver and I'd hand my phone to a cop standing there and I'd tell him where we are and they get on and they talk to the cab driver and tell him where we were and, um, no, everybody was just really really nice. You know, it's sort of I don't know if it was you know something, they were spraying in the air or what, but it works and everywhere?
Speaker 2:if that is, yeah, really can we have some more of? That it's such an electric atmosphere and then having it in paris and and the decision to to take these iconic paris buildings and make them sporting venues was absolutely inspired. I don't know if you watched any of the fencing in the Grand Palais, you know beautiful arch ceilings and the equestrian.
Speaker 2:No, yeah, I went to show jumping at Versailles and just incredible things that in the wrestling venue, which was this temporary building, there was this big statue of a guy on a horse and it'd been in kind of a park so they didn't want to move the statue so they just built the building around it and in the venue, you know you're sitting in the venue watching wrestling and if I looked over to my left there was this big statue of a guy on a horse. So you know it was. And just walking around Paris, you know, which is such a walkable city and I did a lot of walking just the architecture and the buildings and it's just, it was beautiful. It's going to be tough to live up to their example, I think, for LA.
Speaker 1:I do think that they used the city and the iconic city that they are to make it part of the entire experience In a way that, at least as a TV viewer, I hadn't seen before, ever before.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and they have a really well-developed public transit system too, so that made it really easy for the spectators to get to events, and I think they also maybe chose some of their locations to be close to public transportation. It was a lot easier and there wasn't as much traffic congestion as you might've had otherwise.
Speaker 1:That's great, although opening those doors on their Metro does this does stress me out, like the first time, like you know, like it's yes, you gotta push, like I'm like okay, and then once I do it, then I'm okay, but that first time, because I'm just so new york like they'll open right, yeah, right I was standing there my first day in paris.
Speaker 2:I'm standing there waiting for the doors to open. They're not opening and I see how the door is opening and you know, finally this guy comes over to me, touches the door.
Speaker 1:I'm like okay, thanks, sorry, sorry, just hanging out here, but you're right, there was a real melding of that beautiful city and this experience, which it seems like it paid off for them In the well.
Speaker 2:I'm glad that you could see it on TV. I'm sure I'm glad that came through because because, being there, you could really feel it. It was, it was, it was an Olympic experience.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic, and so all of your, all of your matters are done. You don't have more that you have to do for those matters. Have they closed?
Speaker 2:These are all finished. They're. The decisions are published on the cast website and, as far as I know, it's all. It's all over and done with, so I can kind of go back to doing the things I was doing beforehand.
Speaker 1:There you go. So were there events since the last we talked. I think you'd gone to some gymnastics and other things. You talked about weightlifting. Anything else that you went to that might have been. I hope you saw rowing. I hope you did get to see some.
Speaker 2:Oh, I spent a lot of time at the rowing venue the first week and venue the first week and I got to see I don't know if I'd been to the to the wrestling before I talked to you. I went to wrestling, which is another favorite sport of mine, and watched some fantastic wrestling and it also is a very dramatic sport. And then, oh gosh, what else with the track and field was just insane there were so many amazing moments, and just so many.
Speaker 2:I mean, every evening you went there, there was something else and, yeah, I was going to venues as much as I could, but I was also working, and so those demands came first, because they were paying for me to be there. So I fully understood that.
Speaker 1:Did you get to see any of the US women's basketball games?
Speaker 2:No, I didn't, I was going to go to a game, but I got a call and had to go to work and I was disappointed because I was like getting ready to go and I and I didn't get to go. I had to walk out of a gymnastics session when the phone rang, and so you know, when the phone rings, we have to, we have to answer it.
Speaker 1:And I think you mentioned this the last time, but that is how it's happened, because, I mean, let's face it from the outside world there's money, there's intrigue, there's passion about sport. So, Cass, the way they handle these is you get a phone call, you don't get an email.
Speaker 2:Is that right? Yeah, we get a phone call and they you know it'll be one of the staff attorneys saying this new case has come in. We need you to sit on a panel, we need you to sit as a sole arbitrator and if necessary, during that phone call, in that case I stepped out into the hallway and found myself a quiet spot and in some cases I'll set the briefing schedule over the phone, right then and there, so that the parties know what's expected of them, so that the parties know what's expected of them. And then my next job is to get out, find a taxi, find a metro and get to the office and get to work.
Speaker 1:That's wild. I mean it does have, like you know, a little bit of I said this before a little Mission Impossible. Feel to me Like, this is your mission. If you choose to accept it, that's right. That's right, All right. So the next Summer Olympics are the site of your Olympic gold. They're going to be here in the US, in Los Angeles. Are you going to try to head back for 2028?
Speaker 2:Well, my fingers and toes are all crossed that I'll get invited to come back and do it again. I'm told that they thought I did a good job, so I'm hopeful that that bodes well. I would not jump at the chance. I would leap at the chance to do this again. There was a lot of hard work involved and uh, but it was good work and it was interesting work and you know, and getting to be at the Olympics and be kind of an insider on some of the things that are happening was fascinating and exciting. And yeah, I hope so. I really really, really hope so.
Speaker 1:Yes, so do we. We really really hope so. Thank you so much, chris. Thanks for taking us on this journey with you to the 2024 Paris Olympics. We're so grateful that you did. Of course, you know we'd love to have you back anytime to talk to us. Thanks again.
Speaker 2:Just let me know I'm here. You know where to find me.
Speaker 1:I love it. Thank you so much. All right, thank you for tuning into this episode of Legally Bond. If you're listening and have any questions for me, want to hear from someone at the firm or have a suggestion for a future topic, please email us at legallybond at bskcom. Also, don't forget to rate, review and subscribe to Legally Bond wherever podcasts are downloaded. Until our next talk, be well.
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