Three months before this summer’s Paris Olympics, a simmering distrust between the World Anti-Doping Agency and its U.S. counterpart has exploded into allegations of selective policing and a volley of scorching statements, raising uncomfortable questions about how strongly doping is being controlled at the Games.
Following weekend reports that 23 Chinese swimmers tested positive for a banned substance before the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 yet escaped punishment, U.S. Anti-Doping Agency President Travis Tygart went on the offensive, questioning the commitment and motivations of global anti-doping leaders.
“All of those with dirty hands in burying positive tests and suppressing the voices of courageous whistleblowers must be held accountable to the fullest extent of the rules and law,” Tygart said in a statement, prompting a similarly vehement response from WADA.
“Mr. Tygart’s allegations are politically motivated and delivered with the intention of undermining WADA’s work to protect clean sport around the world,” the agency wrote, adding that it would send Tygart’s statement to its legal counsel.
None of the rage fully clarified the revelations surfaced in reports from the New York Times and the German broadcaster ARD that the 23 swimmers tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine at the end of 2020 yet the results were never so much as identified publicly. Thirteen of those swimmers competed in the Olympics, according to the reports, and won several medals, including three golds.
In a 100-minute video news conference Monday, WADA officials acknowledged the tests and said they accepted explanations from China’s anti-doping agency, CHINADA, that the positive tests resulted from accidental contamination before an end-of-year competition. Part of the evidence WADA used to examine the case came from a report by Chinese investigators who found traces of trimetazidine in the exhaust and sink drains of the kitchen at a hotel where the swimmers had been staying.
WADA officials said that because pandemic restrictions prevented them from entering China, they had to rely on the internal reports while consulting outside advice on the probability of such a contamination. Further, because the swimmers had already been cleared by China, WADA had to weigh the chances of successfully appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport to implement punishment. Because the athletes had been cleared, WADA declined to disclose the allegations.
“For me, I operate on evidence, and that’s what the CAS would have to operate on as well in assessing whether or not the explanation should be accepted,” said WADA general counsel Ross Wenzel, who did most of the talking during the news conference. “Certainly [CAS] would not draw any sort of adverse inference or assume skulduggery simply because we were dealing with Chinese authorities.”
Those explanations have seemed hollow to USADA and U.S. Olympic and Paralympic officials who have been worn down by the two-year saga involving Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva, who tested positive for the same substance (also known as TMZ) before the 2022 Beijing Olympics and whose four-year suspension remains tied up in CAS appeals.
Global Athlete, an athlete advocacy group run by former WADA executive Rob Koehler, issued a statement attacking WADA for not disclosing the positive tests and for failing to provide more transparency and to release all of its evidence.
“The alleged failures exposed over the past few days undermine the entire global system of fair and clean sport,” the Global Athlete statement said. “When leadership fails to comply with and enforce the rules, athletes are defrauded, their livelihoods are put at risk, and they lose the ability to succeed through talent, hard work, and perseverance alone. If the allegations are true, WADA’s top leadership has harmed current and future athletes, billions of fans, and the sporting community at large by diminishing the trustworthiness and value of international sport.”
The fact that the Chinese swimmers tested positive for trimetazidine further raised suspicion. One of China’s most decorated swimmers, three-time gold medalist Sun Yang, tested positive for the drug in 2014 and was banned for three months. In 2020, Sun was banned for eight years after he refused to cooperate with blood-sample collectors in violation of rules established by FINA, swimming’s governing body.
Trimetazidine, a heart medication designed for elderly people, has been used by athletes to improve blood flow and add stamina. Because it clears the system quickly, it can be hard to detect in tests.
Former WADA chief investigator Jack Robertson found the contamination explanation implausible. While cautioning that he no longer works for the agency and is looking at the case as an outsider, Robertson said he also questioned China’s explanation.
“How can a heart medicine, in pill form, possibly accidentally find its way into hotel food?” Robertson wrote in a text message. “And at quantities to cause 20-plus athletes to test positive? The likelihood just doesn’t compute. Did these athletes all eat the same dish? Not likely. Did TMZ contaminate multiple food dishes? Not likely. And China has a history of TMZ doping. Are we to accept the investigative result of the Chinese authorities and government?”
On Monday’s video news conference, WADA President Witold Banka said the agency had no evidence of wrongdoing and no credible way to disprove China’s conclusion that the drug had been ingested inadvertently.
“If we had to do it over again, we would do exactly the same thing,” he also said.