The banned performance-enhancing drug at the heart of the figure skating doping scandal unfolding at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics was routinely administered to Russian athletes during the height of that nation's state-sponsored doping years, the Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Grigory Rodchenkov, the Moscow laboratory boss whose testimony led to the exposure of the Russian doping scandal, has said he covered up positive drug tests by Russian athletes for the same drug, trimetazidine, in the lead-up to the 2014 Sochi Winter Games, when Russia topped the medals table.
It has officially been confirmed in the past 48 hours that 15-year-old Kamila Valieva tested positive for trimetazidine in December.
The teenager had won gold in the 2022 Games team figure skating on Monday before the medal ceremony was put on hold on Tuesday as it was only then that the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) lab in Sweden confirmed December's positive test.
There has been no explanation why it took so long for the Stockholm lab to process a December sample; that occurred on 7 February.
Valieva had the standout performance in her team, becoming the first female skater at an Olympics to land the 'quad jump', which involves four full revolutions.
Her situation raises disturbing questions over whether she has been a victim of unknowing child doping, and whether the Russian state is continuing to assist their athletes via banned drugs.
Valieva's coach, Eteri Tutberidze, known for her brutal training...
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