The International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Disciplinary Commission has disqualified six athletes from the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games following positive test results from their reanalysis testing. Three of the disqualified athletes are from China. The cases will be been turned over to the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) following the expiration of the appeal deadlines.
Leading up to the Olympics, the IWF announced that countries with three (or more) positive tests would be suspended for a year. If all three of the Chinese athletes fail to appeal, China will likely face suspension, although it being the first year of the 2020 Quad it would not impact the next Olympic Games.
USA Weightlifter, Norik Vardanian, is also caught up in the reanalysis testing. Vardanian’s positive test, however, came from when he was still competing for Armenia. It will not impact Team USA from a violations standpoint.
The weightlifters implicated in this are the following:
2008 Beijing
Xiexia Chen (CHN)
Lei Cao (CHN)
Chun Hong Liu (CHN)
2012 London
Sibel Simsek (TUR)
Norik Vardanian (ARM)
Intigam Zairov (AZE)
For the current list, check out IWF’s reanalysis section on their website.
