The International Skating Union (ISU) said on Monday that Russia and Belarus would not be allowed to host international skating events and stripped Russia of figure skating’s Rostelecom Cup.
The ISU had earlier banned skaters from Russia and Belarus from international competition over Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine. Belarus is a key staging area for the invasion, which Russia calls a “special military operation.”
The ISU said in a statement that it was looking for a replacement host for the Rostelecom Cup, which is scheduled to take place in late November.
“Until further notice no international competitions shall be held in Russia and Belarus. Consequently, the Rostelecom Cup 2022 in figure skating will not be included in the ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating series of the season 2022/23,” the ISU said.
The ISU also banned members from Russia and Belarus from attending the 2022 ISU Congress and said candidates from the two countries would not be allowed to stand for election to any position. (Reporting by Tommy Lund in Gdansk Editing by Christian Radnedge)
The Court of Arbitration for Sport on Saturday rejected an effort by nine American figure skaters who were seeking to receive their silver medals from the ill-fated team competition at the Beijing Olympics before they left China.
The skaters — Evan Bates, Karen Chen, Nathan Chen, Madison Chock, Zachary Donohue, Brandon Frazier, Madison Hubbell, Alexa Knierim and Vincent Zhou — asked the court to order the International Olympic Committee to award medals in the team event, the results of which have been in doubt for nearly two weeks since a Russian skater, Kamila Valieva, was found to have tested positive for a banned drug.
A separate CAS panel on Monday had allowed Valieva, 15, to continue competing in the Games despite her positive test, saying the uncertainty about the eventual outcome of her doping case — which might lead to only a reprimand given her age — meant she would face “irreparable harm” if she were to be barred from competing.
The American skaters had sought a ruling that would overturn, at least for them, the I.O.C.’s decision to not award any medals in any event in which Valieva placed in the top three. That decision applied only to the team competition in the end; Valieva, cleared to skate, went on to finish fourth in the women’s singles event, crumbling in the long program amid a swirl of accusations, innuendo and pressure.
The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee was not a party to the application, the court said in dismissing it with a single sentence.
“The decision of the I.O.C. Executive Board of 14 February 2022 not to hold the medal ceremony for the figure skating team event during the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 stands,” the court’s panel of three arbitrators wrote.
The court said the panel would publish a fuller explanation of its decision in the coming days, presumably well after the closing ceremony on Sunday. By then, the Americans — and the rest of the Olympians — will be on their way home.
Kamila Valieva training in Beijing on Sunday. She helped Russia win the figure skating team competition last week.Credit…Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York Times
The Russian figure skating star at the center of doping questions at the Beijing Olympics will be allowed to compete in the women’s singles event after a ruling by arbitrators on Monday.
The panel, in a statement, said it would be unfair and cause “irreparable harm” if she were barred from the competition, despite having tested positive for a banned substance in December. That revelation came last week, a day after she had helped lead Russia to a gold medal in the team event.
The skater, Kamila Valieva, 15, has become a face of the Games and is widely seen as the favorite to win the women’s event that begins on Tuesday. The ruling on Monday means she can take to the ice when the short program begins, though questions will surely hang over her performance and the Russian team.
In making the decision, the panel’s statement said, it “considered fundamental principles of fairness, proportionality, irreparable harm and the balance of interests” between Valieva and the organizations seeking to bar her from the Games. Also, it noted, Valieva did not test positive at the Beijing Games, but could face possible penalties when her case is examined after the Olympics.
The case was heard by a panel assigned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, considered the highest legal authority in global sports. Matthieu Reeb, the director general of the court, announced the ruling at a news conference on Monday, less than 30 hours before the women’s event was to begin, but walked off without taking any questions.
The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee quickly issued a statement expressing its disappointment in the ruling. Sarah Hirshland, the committee’s chief executive, said that clean athletes are being denied “the right to know they are competing on a level playing field.”
“We are disappointed by the messages this sends,” Sarah Hirshland, the chief executive of the committee. said in a statement, adding, “This appears to be another chapter in the systemic and pervasive disregard for clean sport by Russia.”
The panel on Monday, however, did not decide whether Valieva was guilty of knowingly using a banned drug. It only decided it was within the discretion of Russia’s antidoping agency to lift a brief suspension of her that it had imposed last week after learning she had tested positive weeks ago for a banned drug. That disclosure came the day after the team event.
In the ruling, the arbitrators rejected appeals by the International Olympic Committee, the World Anti-Doping Agency and skating’s global governing body to reinstate a provisional suspension that would have ruled Valieva out of the Olympics.
The court did not consider whether Valieva was at fault for testing positive for trimetazidine, a heart medication that could increase endurance. Her positive result came from a urine sample that was taken from her at the Russian national championships on Dec. 25 but was not confirmed for about six weeks. The panel that met on Saturday and Sunday in Beijing upheld the Russian antidoping agency’s decision to suspend Valieva for only one day last week before quickly reinstating her.
The Russian antidoping agency said it had received notice from a Stockholm lab of Valieva’s failed drug test only on Feb. 7, the same day that she led the Russians to a gold medal in the team event. The medals for that competition have not been awarded.
The International Olympic Committee, the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Skating Union had filed an appeal with the court last week, seeking to reinstate the suspension, which would most likely have prevented Valieva from competing in Beijing.
“This is a very complicated and controversial situation,” her coach, Eteri Tutberidze, told Russia’s state-run TV network Channel One on Saturday in her first public comments about the case. “There are many questions and very few answers.”
Despite those unknowns, Tutberidze quickly added, “I wanted to say that we are absolutely confident that Kamila is innocent and clean.”
The legal battle over Valieva’s future eligibility is likely to last for weeks, at least. The fate of the Olympic gold medal in the team event also hangs in the balance.
In last week’s free skate in the team competition, Valieva became the first woman to land a quadruple jump. Her performance led the Russians to win the team event, their best showing ever. The United States won the silver medal, and Japan won bronze.
BEIJING—The Winter Olympics were plunged into drama on Friday over a Russian doping case that has rocked the marquee figure skating events here and pitted Russia—already under sanction over state-sponsored doping—against international sports organizations in a court battle that could drag on several more days.
The International Testing Agency, which oversees Olympic drug-testing, ended days of speculation on Friday when it said that Kamila Valieva, a teenage Russian star and jumping phenom, had a positive result for a banned substance in late December.
The test sets up a familiar battle that pits Russia against much of the rest of the global sports community over doping violations. Russia is already banned from international sports competition for its epic state-sponsored doping scheme at the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
The new case puts one of skating’s most supremely talented athletes, the 15-year-old Valieva, at the center of a maelstrom—just after she had won one gold medal and just before she is heavily favored to win another by performing as many as three quadruple jumps in a single program.
It leaves open the question of who won the coveted team title: the Russian Olympic Committee, or perhaps second-place-finisher the United States. And it ensures that the run-up to the women’s singles competition next week—perhaps the most high-profile event of the Games—will be engulfed in legal action.
The ROC took first in the figure skating team event.
Photo:
sebastien bozon/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
The drama began not at the Beijing Olympics, but at a domestic competition in Russia at the end of 2021.
A testing sample collected by the Russian Anti-Doping Agency at the Russian Figure Skating Championships in St. Petersburg in late December was returned on Feb. 8 showing that Valieva had tested positive for trimetazidine, a heart drug, the ITA said.
The drug is typically used to treat coronary heart disease and is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency as the drug can also increase blood flow, which is likely related to increased cardiac output.
The result arrived one day after the 15-year-old clinched victory for the ROC in the figure skating team event on Monday, in which she also became the first female skater to land a quadruple jump at the Olympic Games in a moment that awed fans around the world.
Valieva was briefly suspended by the Russian anti-doping agency, and didn’t practice the next day, before the agency overturned the suspension. She is due to compete again as gold-medal favorite in the women’s singles event Feb. 15.
But her return is far from assured. The International Olympic Committee, the World Anti-Doping Agency and International Skating Union indicated Friday they would appeal the Russian agency’s decision.
Now it will fall to the Court of Arbitration for Sport to determine whether Valieva can compete in the women’s event and whether the ROC will lose the prestigious team title.
The case raises questions about the arrival of the test results at the worst possible moment for all competitors in one of the Olympics’ most popular and high-profile sports. It also comes at a time of heightened geopolitical tensions between Russia and the West, as international sports organizations face renewed questions over the robustness of Russia’s anti-doping stance, and concerns grow around the welfare of child athletes, in particular.
Technically, Russia isn’t even at the Olympics. The international ban means its athletes compete not under the Russian name and flag, but that of the Russian Olympic Committee. Russian officials have previously called the doping suspension politically motivated. And international sports bodies have been accused of being timid in the face of repeated rule violations.
The ROC on Friday said it would take “comprehensive measures” to protect the team and keep its gold medal in the figure skating competition. It also suggested a possible conspiracy against the Russian team, questioning the timing of the test result’s arrival—the day after their team won gold in Beijing—and that it took some 45 days to analyze it.
“It’s very likely that someone held this probe until the end of the team figure skating tournament,” said Stanislav Pozdnyakov, the ROC president. The ITA declined to comment.
The Kremlin, meanwhile, offered its “absolutely unlimited” support to Valieva. On Friday, she skated through an official practice session with multiple falls in a run-through of her free program, then hid her face inside a hooded sweatshirt while passing reporters on the way out.
“We say to Kamila: ‘Kamila, don’t hide your face, you are a Russian woman, walk proudly everywhere and, most importantly, speak up and defeat everyone,” presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, cited by state newswire TASS.
The matter is no less weighty to officials in the U.S. and elsewhere.
“For us, this is less about medals and more about protecting the sanctity of fair and clean sport and holding those accountable that don’t uphold the Olympic values,” said Kate Hartman, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee.
Travis Tygart, the head of the U.S. anti-doping agency, also criticized the delay in getting Valieva’s result.
“It’s a catastrophic failure of the system,” he said. “It’s an awful set of facts that easily could have been prevented.”
The accredited Swedish laboratory that handled Valieva’s Dec. 25 test said it couldn’t comment on a pending case.
And the IOC insisted that it had acted appropriately with regards to ROC and all its competitors.
“We don’t take mass actions against groups of people but against individuals,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams told reporters Friday. “We wouldn’t try a whole class of people and chuck them out.”
“The central principle of the IOC is that we have to be politically neutral,” he said. “We don’t bow to any side in these cases.”
Valieva’s case highlights a structural problem with doping in Russia, dating back to Soviet times, said Lukas Aubin, a researcher at Paris-Nanterre University who focuses on Russian sports and politics.
“The problem is with the structure of the sporting system in Russia where people at the top are asking for better results and those underneath have to deliver, like a pyramid,” Aubin said. “They are fighting against themselves and against their history.”
Trimetazidine, the drug at the center of the Valieva case, was unlikely to have a therapeutic use for a young Olympian, said Aaron Baggish, director of the cardiovascular performance program at Massachusetts General Hospital.
“It is a metabolic modulator thought to increase blood flow to the heart and perhaps improve metabolic efficiency in heart muscle cells,” he said, adding that he believed use as a performance enhancing drug “is uncommon but it is out there.”
Kamila Valieva of the Russian Olympic Committee with teammates and coaches during a training session.
Photo:
EVGENIA NOVOZHENINA/REUTERS
The Russian Figure Skating Federation said Friday that it “has no doubts about [Valieva’s] honesty and purity.”
The case was further complicated by Valieva’s age. Being 15, she counts as a “Protected Person” under the World Anti-Doping Code, which the ITA said had delayed the public disclosure. But with speculation in the media running rampant and several outlets naming Valieva, the organization said it decided to publish more information on the situation.
Valieva, in her first season of being old enough to compete at the senior level, has also emerged as the leader of a pack of talented Russian skaters capable of sweeping the podium by unleashing a slew of exceptionally difficult jumps. She set new highest scores for the women and broke them herself several times during the current season.
That group, almost all of whom are coached by Eteri Tutberidze of Moscow, have achieved extraordinary success through their technical prowess. But their slight frames and short competitive careers have also drawn scrutiny of the physical and mental toll on athletes who have often retired before they are 18.
It all came to an end here, on a tilted chute of ice on an unnamed mountain in China, and the only surprise was that 35-year-old Shaun White did not have one more trick in him.
Riding in his fifth and final Winter Olympics, searching for his fourth gold medal, White finished just shy of a medal in men’s halfpipe.
White’s solid but unspectacular opening run scored 72, putting him fourth of nine competitors. He got within reach of a possible medal on his second run, scoring an 85 that moved him briefly to second place. But Scotty James then scored a 92.5 to take first and knock White back to fourth.
On the third run,Ayumu Hirano, of Japan, landed an epic run with a triple cork, earning a 96 and the gold medal. James, of Australia, took silver, and Jan Scherrer, of Switzerland, won the bronze.
White fell on his third run, quickly got to his feet, took off his helmet and slid slowly into the warm embrace of cheering fans, knowing they had just seen the end of something.
“I always want more, but that’s ok. I did what I could do,” he said, adding with a laugh. “It’s done. I’m so relieved.”
His laughs turned to tears as he thanked his family, his fans and snowboarding.
“I’m proud of this life I’ve led, and what I’ve done in this sport and what I’ve left behind,” he said. “I knew the day would come, but to finally be here is pretty wild.”
White will end his Olympics career — unless he changes his mind on Italy in 2026 — with three gold medals (2006, 2010, 2018), two fourth-place finishes (2014, 2022) and a lifetime of icon status.
He had hoped to plant a big run in his first attempt, to put pressure on his competitors and give himself room to try to elevate even higher in rounds 1 and 2.
The competition promised to be high-flying, and it was. A strong Japanese contingent had eyes on spinning their way to the podium, led by three Hiranos — Ayumu (a two-time silver medalist), Kaishu (his little brother) and Ruka (no relation).
James, a lanky Australian who has led the world circuit in recent years, came in search of an elusive gold medal. Taylor Gold, the American veteran who fought years of injuries after his 2014 Olympic appearance, brought his technical, old-school style, hoping judges would award ingenuity, not just rotations.
But the focus was on White. He had called this a farewell tour, though it was unclear if it was him saying goodbye to competitive snowboarding or fans saying goodbye to him. Both, probably. Either way, it was not an exhibition, and White was granted no favors. White earned his way to the Olympics, after a long season of injuries, Covid and doubts. And then into the final.
He seemed re-energized, and relieved, to have made it through qualifications on his second and final run — drama, always drama — knowing that he would leave the sport still in the most elite class.
Beginning in Turin 16 years ago, through Vancouver, Sochi and Pyeongchang, White ended up on a nondescript mountainside more than 100 miles northwest of Beijing to make his final rides. There were more reporters and cameras gazing at him than fans, the grandstands mostly empty because of the pandemic. But there were countless people watching on screens around the world, including White’s family and friends in and around his native San Diego.
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Ice dancers Madison Chock and Evan Bates – a couple on and off the ice – were chosen as co-captains of the U.S. squad for figure skating’s team event at the 2022 Winter Olympics, so it’s only fitting they get to compete as part of the team.
Chock and Bates’ time finally arrives (emphasis on finally, but more on this to come) Sunday night U.S. time as they were announced by U.S. Figure Skating as the team’s entry for the free dance.
They are joined representing the red, white and blue on the third and final day of the team event by Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier, who will begin the night in the pairs free skate, and Karen Chen, who ends the team event in the women’s free skate.
Chen and Knierim/Frazier represented Team USA in their short programs, while Chock/Bates switch out in ice dance for Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue who won the rhythm dance.
Sunday night marks not only the debut of Chock and Bates at these Games but also their debut in any Olympic team event.
The Sochi 2014 Games marked the Olympic debut of both the team event and Chock and Bates (as a team; Bates also competed in Vancouver in 2010), but they were passed over for a spot on the U.S. team in both 2014 (to Meryl Davis and Charlie White) and 2018 (to Maia and Alex Shibutani).
Chock and Bates are ready now, though, as the 2022 U.S. champions and 2021 world fourth-place finishers, and they’ll attempt to match the win Hubbell and Donohue earned earlier in the Games.
Knierim and Frazier also look to continue their own momentum. They were third in the pairs short, behind world and Olympic medalists.
Heading into the final night, the Russian Olympic Committee leads with 45 points, followed by the U.S. (42) and Japan (39). At this point, Canada (30) and China (29) are vying for fourth.
