In the first days of 2021, seven months before the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Olympics, China's 23 best swimmers tested positive for the same banned drug at a domestic meeting.
Chinese anti-doping officials investigated and declared the incident an unusual mass contamination event that may have originated from the presence of the heart drug, trimetazidine (TMZ), in the kitchen of a hotel where swimmers attend the New Year's event in late December 2020. and early January 2021.
The World Anti-Doping Agency, the global body that oversees national drug testing programs, looked into this episode but later accepted that theory and allowed China to keep the results secret.
During that time, swimmers were allowed to continue racing without suspension or disqualification. Several swimmers who provided positive samples qualified for the Olympics and won medals – including three golds – for China. A few favorites will win again at this year's Paris Olympics.
The case should have remained in the shadows, a secret known only to a select few, with details of one of the most curious episodes in swimming left out of the sealed records. movement of trusted organizations to keep sport fair.
Here are six takeaways from our report.
The China-led investigation has left important questions unanswered.
The global anti-doping system operates as an honor system. Big nations have a responsibility to keep their athletes clean and must trust that other countries will do the same. So China's doping regulator, known as Chinada, had to investigate when 23 athletes tested positive for the same drug at the same domestic tournament.
China assured global regulators that it had conducted an unusually lengthy investigation. And yet, despite what was presented as a meticulous investigation involving scientists, the Chinese national police, and even human test subjects, the Chinese still did not bring answers two basic questions: How did TMZ get into their athletes' systems? And how did this drug, a powerful prescription heart medication available only in pill form, get spread on various surfaces and containers in the food preparation kitchen for some China's best athlete?
Global doping officials reacted differently when a Russian figure skater took the same drug.
When Russia's anti-doping agency disqualified teenage skater Kamila Valieva tested positive for the same drug, TMZ, in 2022, WADA appealed its ruling. It asked the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which adjudicates disputes in global sports, to overrule Russia's decision to disqualify Valieva, who was then still competing at the Winter Olympics in North Terrible.
Valieva said she had unwittingly become a victim of pollution, the same explanation China gives its swimmers. An appeals committee at Russia's anti-doping agency even accepted the claim that Valieva traced the low levels of TMZ in her system to a strawberry dessert prepared for her by her grandfather. she, who said he had a prescription. The court immediately rejected this claim for lack of credibility.
WADA has a far different view on the case of Chinese swimmers. Although the Chinese failed to find the source of TMZ, WADA said it “concluded that it was not in a position to rule out the possibility that contamination was the source of TMZ” and found no reason to appeal China's decision not to act.
Others who tested positive for similar drugs were at least temporarily suspended.
The fact that the Chinese swimmers escaped death despite a short suspension is contrary to recent precedents as well as typical steps to handle questions about the validity of positive test results. count. Even Russia's Valieva was temporarily banned, at least for a few hours, before the Russian disciplinary panel quickly reinstated her.
Last year, the US Anti-Doping Agency suspended former Olympian Katerina Nash, 45, from her position as vice president of international cycling's governing body, after an out-of-competition test found a small amount of a banned appetite stimulant in her system. system. Nash was later exonerated, but only after she proved herself guilty Treating sick dogs with medicine. TMZ is considered by anti-doping regulators to be in the same class as that drug.
Anti-doping experts have rejected key claims made in the Chinese report.
The 61-page report that Chinese officials prepared to clear the 23 swimmers included the claim that low concentrations of TMZ found in all of the athletes' samples were evidence that they were not Use this substance to increase performance.
But experts consulted by The New York Times said that making such a blanket statement is inaccurate and that even such low numbers are not beneficial to swimmers' performance at the moment. hey, they can also easily assume that the test was taken at that time. end of the excretion phase to use larger doses of the drug.
WADA said low concentrations, along with discrepancies in test results, were factors in their decision not to take action.
US law enforcement is concerned.
Federal investigators are aware of this incident and have taken several investigative steps to learn more. It seems strange that the FBI or the Department of Justice would be interested in failed drug tests of swimmers from another country during a competition taking place on the other side of the world. But a law passed in 2020 allows US authorities to pursue drug cheats at any international competition, wherever they are located. Critics of the law note that the statute does not apply to doping programs in the largest U.S. sports leagues, such as the NFL, Major League Baseball or the NBA.
An awkward moment to test positive.
At the time of the positive test, Chinese swimmers were adjusting their training in preparation for qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics, which were delayed a year because of the pandemic . For the International Olympic Committee, a doping scandal involving the Chinese, a major force in world sports, is unlikely to be resolved any time soon. But in mid-2021, just months before the Summer Olympics open, it would be a disaster. At the same time, China, which has been hit by the coronavirus and imposed some of the world's harshest lockdowns, is continuing to push ahead with plans to host the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
