In the first days of 2021, 7 months before the Tokyo Olympics were postponed due to the epidemic, 23 of China’s best swimmers Tested positive for the same illegal drug At a party in the country.
Chinese anti-doping officials investigated the case and declared it an unusual mass contamination incident traced to the presence of heart drugs in the kitchen of a hotel where the swimmers were staying for New Year’s events in late December 2020 Trimetazidine (TMZ). and early January 2021.
World Anti-Doping, the global authority that oversees national drug testing programs, investigated the incident but later accepted the theory and allowed China to keep the results secret.
All the while, swimmers have been allowed to continue competing without being suspended or disqualified. Some swimmers who provided positive samples eventually qualified for the Olympics and won medals for China, including three gold medals. Some are expected to win again at this year’s Paris Olympics.
If the details of one of the most curious events in swimming had not leaked from the sealed archives of the organizations trusted to keep the sport fair, it would have remained in the shadows, a secret known only to a select few.
Here are six key takeaways from our report.
The China-led investigation left key questions unanswered.
The global anti-doping system is an honor system. Major nations have a responsibility to ensure that their athletes are clean and must trust that other nations will do the same. Therefore, when 23 athletes tested positive for the same drug at the same domestic competition, China’s doping regulator (Chinada) should launch an investigation.
China has assured global regulators that it will spare no effort to investigate. Yet despite a painstaking investigation involving scientists, Chinese state police and even human test subjects, the Chinese have not answered two basic questions: How did TMZ get into their athletes’ systems? How did the drug, a powerful prescription heart medication available only in pill form, end up spread across surfaces and containers in the kitchens where food is prepared for some of China’s best athletes?
Doping officials around the world reacted differently when a Russian figure skating star took the same drug.
When Russian Anti-Doping Agency Clears Teen Skater Kamila Valieva Tested positive for the same drug, TMZ, in 2022, WADA appealed its findings. It asked the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the authority that adjudicates global sports disputes, to overturn Russia’s decision on Valiyeva’s innocence while she was still competing at the Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Valieva said she unknowingly fell victim to pollution, which is the same explanation China provides for its swimmers. An appeals committee of Russia’s anti-doping agency even accepted the idea that Valyeva traced the source of low levels of TMZ in her body to a strawberry dessert prepared for her by her grandfather, who said he had a prescription for the drug. The court summarily dismissed the claim as lacking credibility.
The World Anti-Doping Agency has taken a very different stance on the issue of Chinese swimmers. Although China failed to find the source of TMZ, WADA said it “concluded that the possibility that contamination was the source of TMZ could not be rebutted” and that it had no grounds to appeal China’s decision not to take action.
Others who have tested positive for similar drugs have been suspended at least temporarily.
The Chinese swimmers escaped even a brief suspension, which was inconsistent with recent precedent and typical steps for dealing with questions about the validity of positive tests. Even Russia’s Valyeva was temporarily banned from competing, at least for a few hours, before Russia’s disciplinary committee quickly reinstated her eligibility.
Last year, USADA suspended 45-year-old former Olympian Katerina Nash, vice president of cycling’s international governing body, after out-of-competition testing found trace amounts of a banned appetite stimulant in her system. . system.Nash was later exonerated, but only after she proved she had been exonerated Disposal of Medications for Sick Dogs. Anti-doping regulators consider TMZ to be in the same category as that drug.
Anti-doping experts have dismissed a key assertion in the China report.
A 61-page report prepared by Chinese officials to release 23 swimmers claims that the low concentrations of TMZ found in all the athletes’ samples prove they were not taking the substance to enhance performance.
But experts consulted by The New York Times said it would be incorrect to make such a blanket statement, and that even if such low levels were not beneficial to a swimmer’s current performance, they could easily show that the test was at the tail end of the excretion period. Larger doses of medication.
WADA said the low concentration combined with differences in test results were factors in its decision not to take action.
U.S. law enforcement is interested.
Federal investigators are aware of the incident and have taken investigative steps to learn more. It seems odd that the FBI or the Department of Justice would be interested in a swimmer from another country failing a drug test at a competition on the other side of the world. But a law passed in 2020 allows U.S. authorities to track down drug cheats participating in any international competition, no matter where they are.Critics of the law point out that the regulation does not apply to the doping programs of the largest U.S. sports leagues, such as the NFL, Major League Baseball or the NBA
The embarrassing moment of testing positive.
At the time of the positive test, Chinese swimmers were adjusting their training in preparation for qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics, which have been postponed a year due to the epidemic. For the International Olympic Committee, the doping scandal involving the Chinese team, the main force of world sports, is difficult to deal with at any time. But in mid-2021, just months before the Summer Olympics kick off, that would be a disaster. Meanwhile, China, battered by the coronavirus and imposing the world’s toughest lockdown, continues to press ahead with plans to host the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
