Phenom
She’s a fifteen year-old girl. And she’s (arguably) the best figure skater in the world. Kamila Valieva is a Russian phenom. And – she’s tested positive for three different drugs, which, used in combination, has the effect of increasing endurance by impacting the heart muscle itself. Sure skaters need strength. But in a five minute performance, requiring multiple athletic jumps and turns – endurance definitely helps.
If she was a sixteen year-old boy who was legally prescribed an asthma inhaler by his doctor that contained a banned stimulant, they would strip him of his medal and ban him from the Games. That’s the precedent. Ask Rick DeMont, the American “phenom” who won the Gold in the 400 meter freestyle in Munich in 1972. They took his medal away, and sent him home (Daily Advertiser).
I remember that well – I too was a sixteen year-old swimmer, though nowhere near the class of DeMont. But I related to doing “what the doctor told me to do”. I did get to see an Olympic Gold Medal from Munich. It was around the neck of the fifteen year-old girl who sat behind me in class – Deanna Deardurff. She won the gold and set a new world record in the 400 Medley Relay. Deanna was required to compete as a “boy” on our high school team – there was no girls high school swimming at the time.
That crisis was soon eclipsed – first by the five medal performance of DeMont’s teammate, Mark Spitz. And then by the terrorist attack on the Israeli athletes that killed twelve.
Banned from the Games
But the International Olympic Committee established the precedent then: young age is not an “excuse” for testing “dirty”. You lose what you’ve won, and you are banned from the Games. Following a doctor’s orders isn’t an excuse either. And certainly making a “mistake” by mixing your grandparents’ drugs with your own (sounds like a likely story) even at fifteen, shouldn’t get a pass. We would spank a five year-old for that – do we expect less from a fifteen year-old?
Except – for Kamila Valieva. She’s already won a Gold Medal for the Russian Olympic Committee in the team event. Now, she’s favored to win another Gold in the individual contest. And every other athlete (and all those skaters are amazing athletes) on the ice knows, that if SHE tested positive, she would never be allowed in the building, much less on the ice.
A Russian Problem
The title “Russian Olympic Committee” exists, because Russia has a chronic athletic drug abuse problem. In 2014, even the Russian Security Services were part of cheating on drug tests at the Sochi Games. Russian athletes provided “clean urine” far before the Games. Then they used performance enhancing drugs. When they won Medals, the “dirty sample” was literally passed through a secret hole in the testing lab wall, and replaced with the “clean” sample.
And figure skating has had its share of scandal. If you’re old enough to remember when the judges held up cards scored 1 through 10 to score a performance, you’ll probably remember the old joke: “…and the scores are – 9, 9.5, 9, 4 – that was the Russian judge, 9, 9.” The Russian attitude is always win, at all costs. The only failure is in getting caught.
The Russian National team has been banned from the Olympics since 2014. But the “Russian Olympic Committee” can still field contestants, just not under the Russian flag. And here we are again: another Russian athlete with a positive drug test, competing in the Olympic Winter Games.
Unfair Break
Why does she get a “break”? Why did the International Court of Arbitration for Sport allow her to continue in the competition? They claim that this could be an “accidental poisoning”, and that the fifteen year-old shouldn’t be held to the same standard as an adult. They suggest that perhaps the adults, the coaches, should be held responsible, rather than the fifteen year-old (Sports Illustrated).
Or maybe it’s because she’s on the Russian team. The American Olympic Team would have banned her from even getting to the Games. Sha’Carri Richardson never even got to the Court of Arbitration. She tested positive for marijuana – a drug with no athletic benefit to a 100 meter sprinter. She was banned from the US team for a month, by US authorities. That was long enough to remove her from the Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo last summer (NYT).
Or perhaps the Court is afraid that if Valieva is banned, Russia’s President Putin will invade Ukraine. That’s not as far-fetched as it seems. Putin’s actions at the Ukraine border already are on the knife-edge of war, it wouldn’t take much.
So the medal award ceremony has been postponed. Just in case the Court changes its mind, after the Games are over. Or Putin doesn’t invade.
