The gold medalist in one of track and field’s glamor races and a silver winner in cycling are among six athletes from the Beijing Games nabbed for blood doping in the latest Olympic drug scandal.
National sports bodies in Bahrain and Italy confirmed on Wednesday that 1,500m champion Rashid Ramzi and road race medalist Davide Rebellin turned up positive for the new blood-boosting drug CERA in retests of their samples. Dominican women’s weightlifter Yudelquis Contreras and prominent German cyclist Stephan Schumacher were among the others.
A person with knowledge of the results said that Greek race walker Athanasia Tsoumeleka and Croatian 800m runner Vanja Perisic also tested positive.
PHOTO: AFP
If their backup “B” samples also come back positive, the athletes face being disqualified, stripped of medals and banned from the next Olympics.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced on Tuesday that a total of seven positive tests involving six athletes came back positive for CERA, which increases endurance by stimulating production of oxygen-rich red blood cells. The IOC has not named the athletes or the sports involved.
The six new cases bring to 15 the total number of athletes caught doping in Beijing.
The IOC reanalyzed a total of 948 samples from Beijing after new lab tests for CERA and insulin became available following the Olympics.
Ramzi won Bahrain’s first gold medal in track and field and is the first champion from the Beijing Games to be busted for use of performance-enhancing drugs.
If he is stripped of the Beijing victory, Asbel Kipruto Kiprop of Kenya stands to be upgraded from silver to gold. Nicolas Willis of New Zealand would go from bronze to silver, and fourth-place finisher Mehdi Baala of France could move up to the bronze medal.
Taiwan kept its hopes of advancing to the 2026 World Baseball Classic (WBC) alive with a 9-1 victory over South Africa in a qualifier at the Taipei Dome last night, backed by solid pitching. Bouncing back from Friday’s struggles on the mound, when Taiwanese pitchers surrendered 15 runs to Spain, Team Taiwan kept the visiting team in check, allowing just one run in the bottom of the fourth inning. The win was crucial for Taiwan, as a loss would have eliminated the team from contention for the next WBC. Starting pitcher Sha Tzu-chen (沙子宸) struck out one and allowed no hits, except for
The Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) is considering reducing its pitch clock by two seconds to help players better adjust to the rules applied at the World Baseball Classic (WBC). The proposal aims to shorten the pitch timer from 25 seconds to 23 seconds with the bases empty, and from 20 seconds to 18 seconds with runners on base. Currently, the WBC mandates that pitchers deliver a pitch every 18 seconds with the bases empty and 15 seconds with runners on base. The issue was raised during a pre-season CPBL managers’ meeting on Tuesday by Rakuten Monkeys bench and batting
‘SETTING THE TONE’: Donovan Mitchell said that their determination to dominate had nothing to do with past results, but was about a potential post-season clash The Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday boosted their NBA-best record with a 142-105 romp past the New York Knicks, tightening their grip on the Eastern Conference lead with an all-around dominant display. Donovan Mitchell scored 27 points to lead six Cavs players to score in double figures, connecting on five of seven three-pointers as Cleveland drilled 19 from beyond the arc. “I think the biggest thing was just try to set the tone early,” Mitchell said, adding that the determination to dominate had nothing to do with the Knicks’ first-round playoff win over the Cavs two seasons ago and everything to do with
BELGIANS ADVANCE: Club Brugge gave Atalanta a lesson in efficiency, as Gian Piero Gasperini’s team had 29 efforts at goal, compared with seven from the visitors Seldom has a player’s sending off had such an influence on a game. AC Milan was to left rue Theo Hernandez’s second yellow card — for diving — as Feyenoord advanced to the UEFA Champions League last 16 at the former European champion’s expense with a 1-1 draw in the second leg of their playoff on Tuesday, giving the Dutch team a 2-1 win on aggregate. Bayern Munich, Club Brugge and Benfica also won their playoffs, eliminating Celtic, UEFA Europa League winner Atalanta BC and French team AS Monaco respectively. “In soccer everything changes in a second,” said Milan forward
RSS