Doping breaks out at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and once again Russian sport is at the center of the storm. Figure skating talent Kamila Valieva, 15, originally from Kazan in the Republic of Tatarstan, is positive for doping.
A doping different from the more well-known steroids – anabolic steroids or diuretics – but of the ‘S4’ category, which means that it affects her hormonal and metabolic system. As AGI learns from international skating sources, it is a doping most likely assumed without the knowledge of the athlete also because Kamila is not only a minor but even under sixteen and therefore not even attributable in case of positivity.
The substance found is ‘trimetazidine’ which is found in point 4.4 of the sub-list of the category (in 4.3 there is meldonium, already used in Russian sport). Before discussing the case of Kamila Valieva, the first skater in history to perform a quadruple jump at the Olympics (in the long program of the team event in Beijing 2022), it is necessary to go back a few years when from the ‘Sambo-70’ school of Moscow directed by the pair of coaches Sergej Dudakov and Eteri Tutberidze with a certain rapidity more and more competitive baby skaters were ‘baked’, more and more capable of difficult jumps and executed in a perfect way.
Skaters who have written beautiful pages in the history of this sport which in Italy was made famous first by the dance couple Barbara Fusar Poli-Maurizio Margaglio and then by Carolina Kostner. Yulia Lipnitskaya, Evgenia Medvedeva and Alina Zagitova, just to mention the stars, ended their careers very early, who for psychological reasons who, claiming that they have never recovered from a broken foot, have not continued.
In Beijing, in addition to Valieva, the Russian Committee in the women’s competition will be represented by Anna Shcherbakova and Alexandra Trusova, also coached by Tutberidze. Now the case of Kamilia Valieva not only slows down the procedure of formalizing the final ranking of the team event but risks complicating the way towards the redemption of Russia within world sport. Russia as a nation is disqualified for doping reasons by the International Olympic Committee until December 16, 2022.
Valieva tested positive for a doping control on the evening of December 25 in St. Petersburg after winning the Russian national title. On February 8, the accredited laboratory Wada (world anti-doping agency) in Stockholm, Sweden reported that the sample had returned an adverse analytical result for the unspecified prohibited substance trimetazidine which falls into the category of hormonal and metabolic modulators, therefore prohibited by the World Code anti-doping.
Following the positivity, the Rusada (Russian anti-doping agency) suspended the skater with immediate and provisional effect. However, on 9 February the Rusada anti-doping disciplinary commission decided to lift the suspension. Now the burning question passes to the detached section of the Olympic Court of the Arbitration Tribunal of Sport (Cas / Tas) to which the International Olympic Committee (Cio) has decided to appeal after the revocation of the suspension by Rusada.
The decision is expected by February 15 – but apparently it will come sooner – the day in which Kamila should take to the track in the short program of the Olympic Games. The International Testing Agency (Ita) will conduct the appeal before the Cas / Tas on behalf of the IOC. “According to the World Anti-Doping Code, the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada), the International Skating Union (Isu), the Rusada and the IOC have the right to challenge the decision to revoke the provisional suspension before the Arbitration Court of Sport (Tas / Cas) “, writes the International Testing Agency in a note.
Then he adds: “The IOC will exercise the right of appeal and not to wait for Rusada’s motivated decision, because a decision is necessary before the next competition in which the athlete should participate”. Italy explains that “the proceedings on the merits of the apparent violation of the anti-doping regulation, including the athlete’s right to request the analysis of sample B, will be carried out by Rusada in due course”