Hope Solo Standing By Her Claims Against Dancing’s Maksim Chmerkovskiy

A day after news broke that Hope Solo had accused (in her new memoir) professional dancer Maksim Chmerkovskiy of slapping her so “hard” it left her ear “ringing” while they rehearsed for Season 13 of “Dancing with the Stars,” the athlete continued to stand by her allegations.

Speaking to ESPN’s “First Take” on Friday morning about her claims (she also alleged Maks “manhandled” her during rehearsals and berated her for being less than ladylike), the gold medal-winning Olympian suggested her book stories had been legally vetted.

“You have to understand, when you write a book like this, you’re not free to just throw words out that aren’t true. You don’t think that people fact check a book and there isn’t attorney’s involved?” she said on the show. “I assumed, I expected them to come out and deny it, but at the end of the day, I wrote this book and everybody knows that I speak the truth. That’s what I do.”

ABC, the network that airs “Dancing with the Stars,” and BBC Worldwide productions, both had no comment about Hope’s allegations – including that the alleged slap was captured on tape – and the tape was lost – on Friday when contacted by Access Hollywood.

A rep for Maks also had no comment when contacted by Access Hollywood on Thursday evening.

Not mentioning Hope specifically on Twitter, Maks did Tweet, “Life’s best lessons are the ones that you smile through…..while they hurt you the most! I’m bullet proof….FIRE AWAY!”