olympics wrap up - athletes stand up, athletes busted, bolt loses a medal

the 2016 olympics in rio de janerio are now over. regardless of your stance on the olympics in general or these specific games, there was certainly a lot of action in the world of performance enhancing drugs.

before the games even started, there was clearly a lot of drama with russia and whether or not some of their athletes were going to be allowed to compete. after the ioc declared it was up to each sporting body to decide which athletes were permitted to complete, it was a mad scramble of suspensions and bans and reinstatements.

outside of the russian scandal, a number of athletes tested positive and were subsequently not even permitted to travel to rio to have the chance to be caught on the world’s biggest stage. antonis martasidis, a greek weightlifter, and michael o’reilly the 75 kg boxer from Ireland failed tests leading up to the games, amongst other athletes who may or may not have had reasonable medalling chances.

during the games the suspensions and failed drugs tests continued, with at least eight athletes being caught for peds ranging from epo to strychnine. keep in mind that strychnine is a poison that can cause asphyxia (and as a consequence, death), and yet is still used by some athletes in small doses, with the thought that it may be able to maintain muscle strength even during periods of significant muscular fatigue. athletes caught in rio so far are:

izzat artykov - weightlifting

serghei ternovschi - canoe

narsingh yadav - wrestling

kleber da silva ramos - cycling

chen xinyi - swimming

silvia danekova - steple chase

tomasz zielinksi - weightlifting

chagnaadorj usukhbayar - weightlifting

it is likely that we will see many more failed tests as we move forward. it has taken four years, but many samples being re-tested from the london 2012 olympics are now failing doping controls and athletes are being retroactively banned. then again, the quality of doping control in rio was questionable at best, considering the laboratory was closed just prior to the start of the game <>, with some suggesting that this gave athletes a window of opportunity to either dope, or not be concerned with being caught. layer on top of that some strange things occurring around the actual sample collections, and it makes for a fascinating ‘watch this space’ story. first, we had john anzrah, the kenyan track coach, who reportedly attempted to take a doping control test on behalf of his athlete. john claims he was borrowing the athlete id to try and get some food, and simply did not want to refuse the doping officials when his athlete was coincidently chosen for a random drug test. how convenient.

perhaps even more in line with netflix’s hit “stranger things” was the presence of two individual urine samples in darya klishna’s collection container . it seems almost as if two different people produced the sample. or maybe it’s just another case of the tyler hamilton "vanishing twin”.

one of the most high-profile athletes in the world, usain bolt showed the world how great he is by winning his 9th gold medal in rio. however, his reputation as the greatest sprinter of all time may be tarnished, as former team mate nesta carter just tested positive for a sample given in 2008, meaning the 4x100m relay gold won in beijing may be revoked.

the absolute bright spot at this olympic games was the clear message from a number of athletes that they no longer want to associate with dopers. swimmers mack horton and lilly king (australia and usa) lead the charge, publicly calling out former drug cheats and shrugging off the accepted Omertà that is all too often used as a shield by clean and dirty athletes alike. moreover, these athletes appeared to have the backing of their domestic organizations. perhaps the tide is turning in international competition and athletes are starting to engage with the problem; maybe, just maybe, athletes en masse are thinking “enough is enough”.

looking forward to the paralympics, russia has just lost an appeal to allow any of their athletes to compete. from my perspective this is the right thing to do, albeit incredibly difficult for the athletes that are affected. a line needs to be drawn somewhere, and although the ioc mishandled olympic participation, it is good to see they were firm in this instance.

for now, i will just leave this graphic here to ponder over.

get engaged with the conversation on twitter and make sure to subscribe to our mailing list to stay up to date on the latests posts.