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Thread Index:- What the Russian Doping Scandal Means for the 2018 Winter Olympics (Jan 5, 2018
- Russia Banned From Winter Olympics by I.O.C. (Dec 5, 2017)
- Russian whistleblower: 'No accident' if something happens to me (August 16, 2016)
- Hackers discover secret hiding place of doping whistleblower Yuliya Stepanova (August 14, 2016)
- Why fans are brutally dissing Russia at Olympics (August 9, 2016)
- 'I thought the cold war was over': Booed Russian drugs cheat hits back after losing (August 9, 2016)
- In the Olympic Pool, Contempt for Drug Cheats Rises to the Surface (August 9, 2016)
- Russian TV likens Michael Phelps cupping therapy to Meldonium (August 9, 2016)
- All Russian athletes to be banned from Paralympic Games in Rio (August 6, 2016)
- IOC approves entry of 271 Russian athletes for Rio Games (August 5, 2016)
- Director of Russia's Antidoping Laboratory Exposes State-Sponsored Doping Ring
Director of Russia's Antidoping Laboratory Exposes State-Sponsored Doping Ring
By REBECCA R. RUIZ and MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ
MAY 12, 2016
By REBECCA R. RUIZ and MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ
MAY 12, 2016
Dozens of Russian athletes at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, including at least 15 medal winners, were part of a state-run doping program, meticulously planned for years to ensure dominance at the Games, according to the director of the country’s antidoping laboratory at the time.
The director, Grigory Rodchenkov, who ran the laboratory that handled testing for thousands of Olympians, said he developed a three-drug cocktail of banned substances that he mixed with liquor and provided to dozens of Russian athletes, helping to facilitate one of the most elaborate — and successful — doping ploys in sports history.
It involved some of Russia’s biggest stars of the Games, including 14 members of its cross-country ski team and two veteran bobsledders who won two golds.
The anti-doping laboratory of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.
In a dark-of-night operation, Russian antidoping experts and members of the intelligence service surreptitiously replaced urine samples tainted by performance-enhancing drugs with clean urine collected months earlier, somehow breaking into the supposedly tamper-proof bottles that are the standard at international competitions, Dr. Rodchenkov said. For hours each night, they worked in a shadow laboratory lit by a single lamp, passing bottles of urine through a hand-size hole in the wall, to be ready for testing the next day, he said.
By the end of the Games, Dr. Rodchenkov estimated, as many as 100 dirty urine samples were expunged.
After The New York Times asked Russian officials to respond to the claims, Russia’s sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, released a statement to the news media calling the revelations “a continuation of the information attack on Russian sport.”
Dr. Rodchenkov described his own work at Sochi as a “strong accomplishment,” the apex of a decade-long effort to perfect Russia’s doping strategy at international competitions.
“We were fully equipped, knowledgeable, experienced and perfectly prepared for Sochi like never before,” he said. “It was working like a Swiss watch.”
After Sochi, Dr. Rodchenkov was awarded the prestigious Order of Friendship by President Vladimir V. Putin.
Six months ago, however, he had a dramatic change in fortune.
Grigory Rodchenkov, who ran the Sochi laboratory, said he developed a three-drug cocktail of banned substances that he provided to dozens of Russian athletes
In November, the World Anti-Doping Agency identified Dr. Rodchenkov as the linchpin in what it described as an extensive state-sponsored doping program in Russia, accusing him of extorting money from athletes — the only accusation he denies — as well as covering up positive drug tests and destroying hundreds of urine samples.
After the report came out, Dr. Rodchenkov said, Russian officials forced him to resign. Fearing for his safety, he moved to Los Angeles, with the help of Mr. Fogel.
Back in Russia, two of Dr. Rodchenkov’s close colleagues died unexpectedly in February, within weeks of each other; both were former antidoping officials, one who resigned soon after Dr. Rodchenkov fled the country.
The November report was primarily focused on track and field, but Dr. Rodchenkov described the whole spectrum of Russian sport as tainted by banned substances. Admitting to more than what WADA investigators accused him of, he said it was not hundreds of urine samples that he destroyed but rather several thousand in last-ditch efforts to mask the extent of the country’s doping.
Dr. Rodchenkov said he received the spreadsheet naming athletes on the doping program on Jan. 21, 2014, two weeks before the Games and shortly after he arrived in Sochi to begin work at the Olympic laboratory. It was to be used for reference during competition, Dr. Rodchenkov said, and outlined the competition schedule for each athlete. If any of them won a medal, their urine samples had to be substituted.
Until now, a precise accounting of how Russian officials could have executed such a complex doping operation was not publicly known.
Read the complete report at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/13/sports/russia-doping-sochi-olympics-2014.html
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