Russian state TV says 14 of the country’s athletes from the 2008 Olympics failed retests of their doping samples, including 2012 Olympic high jump champion Anna Chicherova. The International Olympic Committee is allowed to freeze and store athletes urine samples for a set period of time, retesting the samples in future years as anti-doping techniques improve.
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However, Russia’s Match TV revealed the names of all 14 athletes, saying they included 10 Olympic medallists.
The Russian Athletics Federation said any athlete found to have used doping in previous years would not go to Rio. If Chermoshanskaya is disqualified, the relay gold medal would pass to Belgium.
The IOC said the re-tests were conducted using the very latest methods of scientific analysis.
If TASS’s list of names is accurate and the numbers originally reported by the International Olympic Committee hold up, that means there are still 17 athletes from 11 different nations and 3 more sports whose samples tested positive.
“Any potential participant in the Olympic games caught using doping in previous years can not be a member of Russia’s national team at Rio”, the federation said.
The Russian athletics doping scandal was earlier brought to light by whistleblowers, including runner Yulia Stepanova and her husband Vitaly Stepanov, a former employee of Russian anti-doping agency RUSADA, who prompted WADA to investigate their shocking allegations about the prevalence of doping in Russian athletics.
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The decision on whether to admit Russian athletes to Rio is expected on 17 June.
