Another Chinese doping controversy pops up during Olympic swimming competition
NANTERRE, France (AP) — Another Chinese doping allegation has flared up at the Paris Games, angering some swimmers who say officials need to enforce drug-testing rules consistently.
The New York Times reported Tuesday that two top Chinese swimmers — including one on this year’s Olympic team — tested positive for a banned steroid in 2022 but were eventually cleared to compete by Chinese officials.
The Times cited two people with knowledge of the matter but did not name them.
This is the third incident reported over the last several months by the Times and others in which the Chinese have blamed food contamination for positive drug tests. The World Anti-Doping Agency accepted the results of the Chinese investigations.
“I saw the report this morning,” American star Katie Ledecky said on Tuesday. “I think I’ve made my thoughts clear. It’s disappointing.”
Italian distance swimmer Simona Quadarella said athletes aren’t sure the testing system works in many countries.
“I think we need some answers from this situation,” she said. “We really don’t have confidence, in the situation, in the testing system — in the testing system in other parts of the world.”
In the most widely reported incident, 11 swimmers named to the Chinese Olympic team were among 23 who tested positive for a banned substance six months before the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. They were allowed to compete and went on to win gold medals in three events. One of those swimmers, Zhang Yufei, has won two bronzes in France, one in the women’s 100 butterfly and another as part of the 4×100 freestyle relay.
Chinese swimmers in Paris have pushed back against doping allegations and say they are tested more than athletes from other countries.
Rob Koehler, the general director of the athletes’ advocacy body Global Athlete, criticized WADA in an email to The Associated Press.
“This is another devastating blow to the credibility of both WADA and World Aquatics, and to clean sport,” he said, referring to the global governing body of swimming. “With this new information, athletes and advocates are resigned to the fact that the guardians of the World Anti-Doping Code are no longer fit for purpose.”
Koehler worked as a deputy director of WADA until 2018.
In a statement, WADA acknowledged the two Chinese swimmers had tested positive and were provisionally suspended for “trace amounts of a prohibited substance metandienone,” a powerful muscle-builder known on the street as D-Bol. The provisional suspension lasted about a year.
WADA said the Chinese anti-doping agency, CHINADA, conducted testing on “hundreds of meat samples from various sources with dozens revealing positive results for metandienone.”
WADA said CHINADA closed the case late in 2023 “without asserting a violation,” which lifted the provisional suspensions.
WADA also said it “is generally concerned about the number of cases that are being closed without sanction when it is not possible to challenge the contamination theory.”
It pointed out “several” similar cases in the past few months in the United States. Many U.S. cases, including a highly publicized one involving sprinter Erriyon Knighton, deal with substances such as trenbolone, which, unlike D-Bol, are usually given to promote muscle growth and appetite in livestock.
The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, which handled that case, released a statement from its CEO, Travis Tygart, who is one of the most outspoken critics of WADA.
“It’s crushing news to wake up to for all athletes and fans of the Olympic movement that the failures of the global anti-doping system have overshadowed what should be a moment to bring the world together,” he said.
One of the two swimmers mentioned in the latest Times report is Tang Muhan, who was on the 4×200 freestyle relay team that won gold and set a world record three years ago in the Tokyo Olympics.
The American team finished second and also broke the previous world mark.
Tang was named to China’s Olympic team this year, and she could swim Thursday in the 4×200 relay.
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