Beijing (AP) – In the doping case of figure skater Kamila Valiyeva, the International Olympic Committee has also spoken out in favor of investigations in the environment of the 15-year-old.
“We would welcome a hard line. The entourage should be looked at in this and all other cases,” said IOC spokesman Mark Adams in Beijing. The environment of athletes includes, for example, coaches, doctors and parents. “This has been missed in some previous cases,” Adams said. The investigators of the World Anti-Doping Agency would now also focus on this aspect.
Team Olympic champion Valiewa tested positive for the banned heart drug trimetazidine at the Russian championships in December. The case only became known after the Russian team triumphed at the Winter Games. Since Valiyeva is still a minor, the focus has also been on coach Eteri Tutberidze, as well as the athlete’s coaches and medics. If a coach or guardian is found to have administered prohibited substances to a minor, a ban of several years is possible.
The International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) is to decide in Beijing in summary proceedings whether the Russian anti-doping agency will lift the provisional ban on Valiyeva. It is also about the right to start for the top favorite in the Olympic women’s singles, which begins on February 15. A judgment will be made in good time, IOC spokesman Adams assured. However, the date of the hearing will not be announced. “We want it to be resolved as soon as possible,” Adams said.
Tygart: Error “Inexcusable”
US doping hunter Travis Tygart sees serious omissions in the Valiyeva case. The delays in the analysis of the figure skater’s doping test in December “should never have happened,” said the head of the American anti-doping agency Usada on “Yahoo Sports”. According to the Russian anti-doping agency Rusada, the positive result for the banned heart drug trimetazidine was only transmitted by the Stockholm test laboratory on February 7, i.e. shortly after the Olympic team competition. This was “inexcusable” and a “catastrophic failure of the system,” railed Tygart.
Rusada cited the current corona situation and sick laboratory staff as reasons for the delay in evaluating the test. He doesn’t think so for a second, Tygart assured. “Send it to another lab if something like that happens,” added the doping investigator, who once convicted cycling star Lance Armstrong.
Normally, anti-doping authorities would even speed up such test evaluations before major competitions in order to prevent scenarios like the one at the Winter Games.