The big gold moment was denied to them eleven years ago, now the German biathletes around Arnd Peiffer and Erik Lesser hope for a happy ending after years of waiting in the doping case Jewgeni Ustjugow – preferably at the 2026 Olympics in Italy. Sunday.
Simon Schempp also described the idea of a possible subsequent allocation of the gold medal at the winter games 2026 in Italy, “great” Peiffer said – and Daniel Böhm is convinced that the most positive effect is “that we can now celebrate our success a second time.”
In 2014, the German biathlon relay of the men at the Olympic Games in Sochi/Russia gained the gold medal by 3.5 seconds and won silver behind Russia – but in October 2020 the International Sports Court CAS had closed the Russian relay participant Jewgeni Ustjugow due to a doping offense.
Biathlon: Peiffer feels “a great satisfaction”
In May, a Swiss Federal Supreme Court rejected Ustjugow’s last instance. After lengthy procedures and years of waiting for the German biathletes, the International Committee (IOC) can therefore decide to re -award the medals at the 2010 and 2014 Winter Olympics, the German quartet then waves gold.
However, the joy of the moment will never be able to understand the Sochi relay, because “the extraordinary moments have been stolen to us,” said Lesser. He would find it “great” that justice would still be taken care of.
Peiffer, who was the only one in the quartet after his Sprint Triumph 2018, was also able to call himself the Olympic champion, finds tough words: “The cherry was stolen on the cake”. Therefore, he does not prove that he “feels a great deal of satisfaction, as it has come now.”