Doping Suspected Russian Paralympic dopers remain unpunished
Dozens of suspected Russian doping cases from the Sochi 2014 Paralympics remain unsolved – for the same substance as figure skater Kamila Valieva. In a familiar story of inaction in world sport, it is athletes from Ukraine of all places who have missed out the most.
In race after race, Ukrainian and Russian Paralympians battled for gold amid the backdrop of conflict. Not in 2022 - when the International Paralympic Committee, IPC, eventually u-turned in the face of heated criticism to belatedly ban Russian participation at the ongoing Games in Beijing - but in 2014 in the mountains of Sochi.
Taking place just days after the Russian annexation of Crimea, Russia and Ukraine shared the podium in 22 separate cross country and biathlon events. It was heralded as a demonstration of sporting competition in the face of adversity.
Suspected tampering affecting 21 Paralympic medals
Eight years later justice has still not been done despite the unearthing of a state sponsored doping scandal, first exposed by ARD’s Doping Editorial Team, in which tainted urine samples were exchanged for clean ones in a secret laboratory at both the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The World Anti-Doping Agency-commissioned McLaren Report concluded that "six winners of 21 Paralympic medals were found to have had their urine samples tampered with at Sochi." Those under suspicion included Roman Petushkov: winner of six gold medals in his home Games.
An initially strong reaction followed from the IPC, who, unlike their Olympic counterparts, fully blocked Russian participation at the Rio Games in 2016. But the IPC’s chasing of these individual cases has been far less immediate. Not a single athlete has so far been sanctioned.
Same substance as ice skater Valieva
Grigory Rodchenkov, the Moscow Laboratory director who masterminded the doping cover-up in Sochi before fleeing Russia and exposing the scandal, explained what happened further. In his 2020 autobiography, The Rodchenkov Affair, he writes: "we began to detect numerous positives among Russian athletes…specifically we were finding trimetazidine, a common stimulant widely used in the Eastern bloc."
Trimetazidine had only been added to the WADA Prohibited List at the beginning of 2014 and, in Rodchenkov’s view, "it seemed that the Russian Paralympic athletes hadn’t been informed of the change". It is the same substance which produced a positive test during last month’s Olympic Games for 15-year-old figure skating champion Kamila Valieva. Her case, which is still under investigation, has been blamed by her team on a glass of water contaminated with her grandfathers heart medication. But it had been used by Russian sporting champions years earlier.
In response to questions from the ARD, the IPC said only that they still have "some open cases with regards to Russian athletes", adding: "As they are open and very complex cases, we cannot disclose the identity of said athletes."
“Fear and reluctance” to blame for not pursuing cases
Rodchenkov is not impressed. The Russian, who remains under witness protection in North America, believes a decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, CAS, in 2018 to overturn other Russian doping cases in Olympic sport, has dissuaded the IPC from pursuing theirs. "It was IPC’s fears and reluctance to conduct a serios investigations, to impose a proper sanctions and severe medal redistribution, and then finally fight in CAS," he told ARD. "It prevented IPC from wide-scale enquiry."
If the six winners of 21 Paralympic medals were ultimately disqualified, Ukraine would stand to inherit six gold medals, enough for a remarkable second place in the medals table behind Russia. Germany would also be in line to inherit one, for Anja Wicker in the 12.5 kilometres sitting biathlon.
"The IPC’s reluctance to ban Russia from the Paralympic Games this week was a clear display of the power the Russians, and by extension the IOC, yield over the Paralympic movement," said Rob Koehler, the head of the Global Athletes sports organisation. He added: "One would wonder if these are the same reasons why doping cases from the 2014 Sochi Paralympic Games have not been vigorously pursued."