A four-year suspension from skating was imposed on Kamila Valieva, the teenage Russian gold medalist in the 2022 Olympic team event, after she was convicted of a doping offense.
The previous decision by the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) that exonerated Valieva was overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), following an appeal by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) that challenged her innocence.
On Monday, CAS revealed that Kamila Valieva was found to have trimetazidine in her system, a drug that boosts stamina and is used for heart conditions, right before the Beijing Olympics on December 25th , 2021. The CAS said that Valieva had failed to establish how the substance entered her system, and that she had committed an anti-doping rule violation.
They also said that Valieva’s results from the 2022 Olympics and any subsequent events were disqualified, and that she was ineligible to compete through December 24th, 2025.
The CAS decision ends a long and controversial saga that began in February 2022, when news of Valieva’s positive test emerged after she had helped the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) team win gold in the figure skating team event, ahead of the USA and Japan. The ROC team, which also included Anna Shcherbakova, Alexandra Trusova, and Evgenia Medvedeva, had initially celebrated their victory, but no medals were awarded pending the outcome of Valieva’s case.
Kamila Valieva was cleared of any “fault or negligence” by a RUSADA panel in December 2022, who claimed the drug was taken by mistake. Valieva also rejected any deliberate doping, and claimed she was unaware of trimetazidine. However, the RUSADA ruling was appealed by WADA and the International Skating Union (ISU), which argued that Valieva had violated the anti-doping rules and should be sanctioned accordingly.
The CAS hearing in Lausanne, Switzerland, adjourned in September 2023, after the arbitrators asked for further documentation and evidence. The final ruling was now announced on Monday, January 29th, almost two years after the Olympics.
The CAS verdict means that the ROC team will lose their gold medal in the figure skating team event, and that the USA team will be upgraded to gold. The Japan team will be upgraded to silver and the Canada team will get the bronze medal.
