Day Seven: 4 golds, 2 bronzes for China
Saturday, 16th August 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
China pulled in four gold medals on Friday, along with two bronzes. It was enough to keep China ahead of the United States in the gold medal count, but not enough to eclipse the USA's overall lead.Weightlifting
Cao Lei (women's 75 kg ) and Lu Yong (men's 85 kg) kept the momentum in weightlifting going, winning China's gold medals number seven and eight in the sport.
Du and Yu celebrate badminton gold with their coach
Badminton
China won both gold and bronze in women's badminton doubles. In the gold medal match, Du Jing and Yu Yang beat Lee Kyung-won and Lee Hyo-jung of South Korea (21-15, 21-14). In the bronze medal match, Wei Yili and Zhang Yawen, who had lost to Du and Yu in the semifinals, beat the Japanese duo of Miyuki Maeda and Satoko Suetsuna (21-17, 21-10).
Judo
Tong Wen took down Maki Tsukada of Japan to claim gold in the women's +78 kg division.
Gymnastics
Yang Yiling took bronze in the women's gymnastics all-around, coming in behind Americans Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson. Yang's best performance was on uneven bars, where she tallied a 16.725, the highest score given in any event of the competition. Her 15.75 on the beam placed her fourth in that discipline, but her scores on the vault (15.175) and the floor routine (15.00) gave her an overall of 62.650, not enough to beat out Johnson's 62.725 for silver.
Image: BOCOG
Tags: badminton, Beijing Olympics, Cao Lei, Du Jing, gymnastics, judo, Lu Yong, Olympics, Tong Wen, Wei Yili, weightlifting, Yang Yiling, Yu Yang, Zhang Yawen
Weightlifter Chen wins China's first gold
Saturday, 9th August 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Chen Xiexia wins China's first gold medal of the 2008 Olympics.
Weightlifter Chen Xiexia was the first to win gold for the home team, winning the women's 48 kg competition, lifting 95 kg in the snatch and 117 kg in the clean and jerk.
The honors of the first gold medal of these Olympics went to the Czech Republic, when Katerina Emmons won the women's 10-meter air rifle competition. China's hope in that event, Du Li, did not medal. She fell out of contention with a poor final round performance, earning the seventh worst score out of the eight remaining competitors.
Tags: Beijing Olympics, Chen Xiexia, Du Li, gold, shooting, weightlifting
What to watch for today: China's first gold
Saturday, 9th August 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Look for China's first gold medal to come from one of these athletes today:Shooting: Du Li (10-meter air rifle, women)
Du Li (杜丽) won gold in Athens. If she wins today, it should be the first gold medal of these games, period.
Weightlifting: Chen Xinxia or Yang Lian (杨炼) (48 kg, women)
Chen won gold in three different events in the 2007 Olympics. She is the world record holder in the clean & jerk. Yang won gold at the 2006 world championships and holds the record in the snatch.
Fencing: Tan Xue (sabre, women)
Tan was the sabre silver medalist at the 2007 world championships.
Shooting: Tan Zongliang (10-meter air rifle, men)
Tags: Beijing Olympics, Chen Xinxia, Du Li, fencing, Olympics, shooting, Tan Xue, Tan Zongliang, weightlifting
Seven more athletes fail drug tests
Thursday, 3rd July 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
UPDATE: This AFP report names one of the tainted athletes, wrestler Luo Meng, and says that Luo's coach has also recieved a lifetime ban. The report implies that the others involved were provincial level athletes and not Olympic hopefuls for the 2008 games.Pre-Olympic drug testing by the China Anti-Doping Agency has outed seven more Chinese athletes, aside from swimmer Ouyang Kunpeng, who have taken banned substances (Xinhua report)
The report names no new names, but says that among the busted athletes are two divers, two track and field athletes, two swimmers, one weightlifter and one wrestler.
"Finding drug cheats is not an embarrassment to us. On the contrary, it says what a firm stance we take in the fight against doping," the article quotes Yuang Hong, head of the Chinese Olympic Committee Anti-Doping Commission, as saying after the news.
The story also says that 110-meter hurdler Liu Xiang has been tested at least six times outside of competition in the past six months.
Related:
Chinese swimmer fails drug test
Liaoning doping raid
Tags: doping, Ouyang Kunpeng, swimming, track and field, weightlifting, wrestling
Greek Lifters Banned
Wednesday, 18th June 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
The 11 Greek weightlifters who tested positive for steroids will definitely not compete in the Olympics in August. The International Weightlifting Federation has banned them for two years. The team can still send four clean athletes to Beijing.Related:
Greek Weightlifters' B Sample Positive, Coach Still Blames Chinese Firm
Greeks Blame Doping Scandal on Chinese Lab
Supplement Company Closed in Doping Scandal
Tags: doping, Greek, Olympics, weightlifting
Greek Weightlifters' B Sample Positive, Coach Still Blames Chinese Firm
Wednesday, 7th May 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
Greek weightlifter Leonidas Sampanis lost his Athens bronze after a positive drug test.
Greek coach Christos Iacovou, who resigned after the test results were announced, still contends that his team was shipped a tainted batch of supplements by Chinese nutritional supplement maker Auspure Biotechnology. In his statement, he called for the Greek prosecutor to seek the help of Chinese authorities in securing testimony from Auspure, according to this report.
One of the athletes is reportedly threatening legal action against anyone found to have caused her to unknowingly consume a banned substance.
Weightlifting is a sport where China has a history of success and multiple medal contenders.
Related stories:
Supplement Company Closed in Doping Scandal
Greeks Blame Doping Scandal on Chinese Lab
Image: Esporte.uol.com
Tags: Greece, Olympics, weightlifting
Supplement Company Closed in Doping Scandal
Wednesday, 23rd April 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
China's State Food and Drug Administration has said that Auspure, the company blamed by Greek weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou for his athletes' positive drug tests, is not registered as a drug producer, and that the company has now been closed.Forward movement on the Greek weightlifting doping scandal is on hold, as the coach and players prepare for their court appearances during the first week of May. The eleven athletes tested positive for banned substances in March and the results were made public earlier this month.
Iakovou resigned his job, but not before fingering Auspure Biotechnology, a Shanghai-based nutritional supplement supplier, as the guilty party. Iakovou's attorney said he had an e-mail from Auspure accepting blame for tainted vitamins.
Plenty of questions, which may or may not be answered in the upcoming hearings, remain in this sad saga: Did the athletes know what they were putting in their bodies? Did Auspure jack the substances up at the request of Iakovou or did the company get sloppy with its quality control? Or did the athletes acquire their banned substances in another place altogether?
A quick search of the United States Food and Drug Administration's online records reveals that Auspure products were denied entry to the country multiple times because they were deemed impure. If the athletes were indeed doped by a Chinese lab without their knowledge, it still looks like Iakovou failed to do his due diligence and shirked his responsibility to look out for the health of his athletes.
Tags: doping, Greek, Olympics, weightlifting
Greeks Blame Doping Scandal on Chinese Lab
Wednesday, 9th April 2008 ~ Maggie ~ Link ~ Comments (0)
When the International Weightlifting Federation announced on April 6 that 11 Greek weightlifters tested positive for banned substances it was a bombshell that seemed to signal the end of Greece's Olympic weightlifting hopes. But we didn't report it here because the story seemed only marginally China-related.What a difference a few days make. Now the Greeks are blaming the positive tests on tainted nutritional supplements, made in—you guessed it—China. The Greek Weightlifting Federation even says it has evidence, in the form of a written apology from a Chinese pharmaceutical company, according to a report in The Guardian.
The report includes the following statement from Michalis Dimitrakopoulos, lawyer for Greek weightlifting coach Christos Iacovou:
"I have the letter from one of China's biggest pharmaceutical companies with which they apologize for the tragic mistake of sending nutritional supplements which included some banned substances."
The athletes are already sitting out the European Championships, which start April 11. Their fate rests with the International Weightlifting Federation. If the letter is found to be genuine, it would help clear the athletes' names but may have little impact on whether they compete in August. According to the IWF's bylaws, athletes can be found in violation whether they intentionally took the substances or not.
According to the International Herald Tribune, the company named by Dimitrakopoulos is Shanghai-based Auspure Biotechnology.
In its listing on eChinachem.com, Auspure says it exports 100 percent of its products and steroids are among its product categories. Since at least August 2007 and as recently as January, the United States Food and Drug Administration has refused several Auspure products entry to the U.S. market due to adulteration. Auspure declined to comment when we contacted them by phone today.
Tags: Auspure, doping, Greece, weightlifting