Hamm keeps his gold

"The Court of Arbitration has decided to dismiss the appeal," a court spokesman told reporters. "This means that the ranking of the men's individual gymnastics all-round event remains the same.

Hamm became the first American man to win the Games all-round title in Athens on August 18 but just three days later it transpired he had been awarded the title due to a scoring error.

In one of the biggest controversies of the Athens Olympics, the governing body of gymnastics (FIG) ruled bronze medallist Yang should have been awarded the gold as he was incorrectly docked a 10th of a point from his parallel bars routine.

The FIG immediately suspended the three technical judges involved but refused to redistribute the medals.

Following a 12-hour hearing at its headquarters in Lausanne last month, CAS upheld the original result to end almost two months of legal wrangling.

South Korea's appeal had been based on the fact that had Yang been credited with the correct difficulty score, he would have finished with a total of 0.051 ahead of Hamm.

In a letter to Hamm, the FIG declared the South Korean was the "true winner of the all-round competition" and requested he surrender the gold medal to Yang as the "ultimate demonstration of fair play".

The suggestion was angrily rejected by American Olympic chiefs, who accused the FIG of attempting to shift the blame for its own mistakes on to the shoulders of Hamm.

An adamant Hamm also refused to relinquish his prize.

"I personally feel that I was the champion that night and what I did was absolutely incredible to come back from 12th place after (a fall from) the vault and I don't think that anyone should take that moment away," Hamm said.

However, after the CAS hearing on September 27, Hamm added: "If it is determined by the rules of gymnastics that I should give back my medal I will.

"Yang is a great athlete and the dispute doesn't involve his or my actions. I empathise with him and prefer that this could be resolved on the field of play."

With the FIG refusing to change the final standings, the South Koreans embarked on a quest to get their athlete his rightful award.

"He wants this very obvious misjudgement to be corrected...that's not Paul Hamm's medal, that's his own medal," South Korean delegation spokeswoman Yoo Jae-soon had said at the time. "It is a matter of basic fairness and justice."

Yang was given a hero's welcome when he returned home and his Olympic committee also presented him with a symbolic gold medal to compensate for missing out in Athens.

"I vow to return with the gold medal from the CAS hearing," Yang told his supporters.

It was a promise he was unable to keep.