The spectators agreed when the swimmers took their starting positions in the final for the 100-meter breaststroke as they booed Yulia. When asked if she felt she’d made a statement with her win, King later told NBC, “I hope I did”. “I basically said what everybody else was thinking so they (other swimmers) were glad I spoke out and had the guts to say that”.
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King’s medal is the third swimming medal for the Hoosiers already in Rio, as IU alum Cody Miller won bronze in the men’s 100m breaststroke and IU junior Blake Pieroni earned a gold medal as a member of Team USA’s 4x100m freestyle relay team on Sunday.
Other athletes backed King, with Ireland’s Fiona Doyle saying: “Cheaters are cheaters”.
“That’s just my personality”, she said.
“It breaks my heart and I wish somebody would do something about it”.
Organisers were forced to make an unprecedented appeal to athletes after the legendary Michael Phelps – the most decorated Olympian of all-time – waded into the row over swimmer Yulia Efimova.
Efimova tested positive for steroids in 2013 and was subsequently banned for 16 months. Efimova has twice been suspended for doping, though the second ban was overturned earlier this year.
“Efimova has tested positive five times and she’s gotten away with it again”. “It would have really been the end of a fairytale, a awful dream, if I’d won gold. If yoghurt gets banned and you’re positive, is that your fault?” A stunning swim. And with that, a win for clean athletes everywhere in an Olympics where no one is sure the playing field is really level. “Everyone stepped up their game, and I was lucky that my game was a little bit better tonight”.
“I’m in Russian Federation only one month a year, I don’t know what’s happening there and I don’t believe it”.
“And I’m going to stick with my guns”.
The meeting was highly anticipated, and it didn’t disappoint – particularly from Lilly King’s point of view. “This is so unfair”.
The three were then obliged to attend a joint media conference that was dominated by the issue of doping, especially since King had criticized the Russian for raising her finger in victory after winning her semi-final.
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Now, like I said, most athletes would brush off a question if they were caught mocking a competitor but Lilly King isn’t most athletes.
