At the 2012 Olympics in London, Sergei Kirdyapkin of Russia won the Gold medal in the 50km walk while Rob Heffernan from Ireland finished 4th.
It has been announced earlier today that the Russian has been suspended while he is being investigated for irregularities in his biological passport. According to media sources, this could endanger the walkers results at the 2012 Olympics if he is deemed to have competed with blood values associated with doping. Achievements from the 2008 Olympics will not be affected, since the biological passport system was introduced by the IAAF in 2009.
If Kirdyapkin is stripped of his Olympic Gold medal then Rob Heffernan will be upgraded to an Olympic Bronze.
Following the German documentary on doping in Russia recently, the true scale of cheating in the country has come to light. Here is one simple statistic.....Out of the 17 gold medals won by Russian walkers at the Olympics and world championships in the last decade, 16 were won by athletes who have been banned for doping at some stage of their careers or who are currently under investigation.
Another Russian who has been investigated is Olga Kaniskina who won gold in the Women's 20km Race Walk in World Championships inBerlin in August 2009. In that race, Olive Loughnane finished second for Silver. If the Russian is eventually suspended then the Irish woman will be getting a World Championship Gold medal.
5 comments:
That is an absolute joke. Surely if there are so many doping from one country (16 out of 17 gold medals) the country itself needs to be sanctioned and even banned as they obviously have zero regard for the doping rules. Only some drastic and severe will resolve it.
wll done Rob you desere it.
Liam Fleming
Above comment re Russia is an excellent one, in my opinion. Perhaps a national fereration should be sanctioned, as well as individual athletes. How those cheater's can stand with pride on the podium is beyond me. They are an absoulte disgrace.
I heard on the radio this morning that the Russians are holding on to their medals... How is this possible!? I hope its not true.
Re: comment on Russians holding on to medals. I don't imagine they will want to give them up at all. Read article on Rté website yesterday about Olives long wait for her gold medal. This is probably half the reason for the wait, the other half being red tape.
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