The Associated Press reports that the Court of Arbitration for Sport has disqualified Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva from her gold medal at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics due to her use of a banned medication. That will retroactively elevate the U.S. to the gold medal in the team event, having qualified earlier for the silver medal, and move Japan and Canada respectively to silver and bronze medals. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov risibly claimed the decision was "politicized." (As an aside, Russian troops are using drugs in Ukraine to dull the horror of fighting Putin's bloody and illegal war, too).
The Russians are notorious for doping their athletes and trying to rig their tests in order to qualify for Olympic and other international sporting events. They're bad at it, so they get caught and sanctioned. Expect them to try again for the 2024 Paris Olympics because they can't help themselves.
(image: Getty Images)
