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DOPING

Norwegian biathlon champ: ‘Make clear example’ out of doping Russians

Olympic biathlon champion Martin Fourcade of France has threatened to lead a boycott of the sport's World Cup series unless the international federation takes tough action against Russian doping.

Published: 16 December 2016 12:22 CET
Norwegian biathlon champ: 'Make clear example' out of doping Russians
Norwegian biathlon champ Emil Hegle Svendsen said he would support a ban of the Russians. Photo: Primoz Lovric / NTB scanpix
Fourcade and other top biathlon competitors, including Norway's 2010 Olympic champ Emil Hegle Svendsen, are furious after the International Biathlon Union said 31 suspicious Russian cases had been raised in the latest report by Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
 
“It's not like it's only one or two. It's 31 added to the 12 we had over the few past years in biathlon,” French champion Fourcade told Norwegian television channel NRK.
 
“If my federation don't get big balls enough to tackle the problem, athletes have to do it on their own,” added Fourcade, winner of 10 world championship titles, speaking from a World Cup event in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic on Thursday.
 
“If nothing is done in January I will ask my colleagues in international teams, I mean Norway, I mean Germany, I mean Czech Republic, I mean all the nations, to not compete. I will be proud to do it for my sport to be clean,” he said. 
 
For his part, Svendsen said “the IBU must make a clear example to show that this will not be tolerated. I support the IBU if they do it.”
 
Norway's Anders Besseberg, the IBU president, told NRK he could not exclude a total ban on Russian athletes.
 
An IBU body investigating cases brought up by the McLaren inquiry into doping in all Russian sport held its first meeting on Thursday.
 
“Following the report publication, the IBU received 31 executive summaries on investigations related to Russian athletes,” said an IBU statement.
 
“At the moment the group is still reviewing and evaluating the evidentiary disclosure packages that contain detailed information on each individual case.”
 
The expert group is to recommend disciplinary action to the IBU executive board on December 22nd. The 31 athletes involved have not yet been named.
 
“The IBU is truly appalled and deeply saddened by the findings of the McLaren report. The IBU has always emphasised clean sport, the fight against doping and protection of clean athletes as its top priorities,” said the statement.

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SPORT

Nurse weeps as tells German court of her blood doping role

A nurse, one of the co-defendants in the trial of a German sports doctor accused of masterminding an international blood-doping network, described on Friday how she helped athletes dope with illicit blood transfusions.

Published: 19 September 2020 10:19 CEST
Nurse weeps as tells German court of her blood doping role
Mark Schmidt talks to his lawyer in court. Photo: Peter Kneffel/AFP
Sports physician Mark Schmidt, 42, and four co-defendants who allegedly aided him, stand trial in Munich accused of helping at least two dozen athletes undergo blood transfusions to boost performance.
   
So far, 23 athletes — mainly skiers and cyclists — from eight countries are known to be involved.
   
If found guilty, Schmidt and his co-defendants face jail for up to 10 years under anti-doping legislation introduced in Germany in 2015.
   
One of the accused, named only as Diana S., told the court how she first helped Schmidt in December 2017 when she travelled to Dobbiaco, Italy, to administer a blood transfusion before a skiing competition.
   
Blood doping is aimed at boosting the number of red blood cells, which allows the body to transport more oxygen to muscles, thereby increasing stamina and performance.
   
 
“It was about transportation, blood and athletes, but at first I didn't know what was behind it,” she is quoted as saying by the German media.   
 
“The treatments were always such that before the race the blood was taken in and after the races, the blood came out.”
   
She claimed to have been given precise instructions “via WhatsApp or by phone calls” where to go, which car to take, who to treat and how much blood to take or inject.
   
The trained nurse, who often sobbed while speaking, was told to dispose the bags of used blood on her way home after the “treatments”.
 
The single mother of three said she was motivated to earn extra money, having been told she would earn 200 euros ($237) per day.
   
At one point, she claims she told Schmidt that she wanted to stop.
   
“I told him that I was too agitated and too scared” to keep doing the clandestine work, because a sense of “panic travelled with me”, but Schmidt convinced her to stay involved. “It is also true that I simply had a shortage of money.”
   
Schmidt is alleged to have helped skiers who competed at both the 2014 and 2018 Winter Olympics and cyclists who raced at the 2016 Rio summer Olympics, as well as the Tour de France, the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a Espana.
   
He was arrested in Germany as part of Operation “Aderlass” — or “blood letting” in German — which involved raids at the Nordic world skiing championships in Seefeld, Austria in February 2019.
   
A verdict in the trial is expected by late December.
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