He was, but his save file took a little longer to check than yours. And that's why his result didn't make it into the preliminary results table.
Sincerely.

This won't work. In the future, if a player's result was NOT on the preliminary results, then in the final, his result is NOT VALID. What does it mean that his save file took longer to check? In order to announce the preliminary results, the save files don't even NEED to be checked, meaning for legitimacy of the playthrough - you just need to take his result from there and announce it. You can check the save files later for the final as long as the organizer wants.