This morning the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced that results from the second round of retests from the 2008 and 2012 Games have returned.
Thirty athletes from Beijing tested positive for banned substances while 15 more from London have tested positive. While the IOC says it cannot yet release names or other detailed information, the Committee did announce that of those 30 positive samples from Beijing, 23 of them came from Olympic medalists.
To date, only two names have been officially released in association with positive retests. Both of those athletes are weightlifters- Sibel Özkan of Turkey and Ukraine’s Yulia Kalina.
In May, the first wave of retests revealed positive tests from 2008 belonging to athletes from 12 nations and six sports. London’s positive retests came from six countries and five sports.
The second wave now shows positive tests from athletes from eight nations and four sports in 2008 and nine nations and two sports in 2012.
The IOC’s release says, “All athletes found to have infringed the anti-doping rules will be banned from competing at the Olympic Games Rio 2016.”
These results come at the end of what has already been a busy week of doping news. On Monday, the independent McLaren Report was released. More news of systematic doping in Russia elicited responses from athletes, and organizations worldwide.
Read more from the International Olympic Committee here.
At last they’re taking direct action against these cheats. In 1980 a friend won a Silver medal in Moscow. Once the wall fell they had the medical records of the Gold medalist, the only swimmer who ever beat her, and it showed years of doping from her early teens. Unfortunately the IOC wouldn’t upgrade Sharon to the Gold she deserved after a lifetime of dedication.