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On March 21, the athlete information released by the official website of the IAAF showed that the bronze medal of the Tokyo Olympic Games of the Chinese relay team was officially confirmed! In the personal honor column of Su Bingtian, Xie Zhenye, Wu Zhiqiang and Tang Xingqiang's athlete profile pages, the "Olympic Bronze Medalist" entry has been added.
On August 6, 2021, in the men's 4X100m relay final at the Tokyo Olympics, the Chinese team of Su Bingtian, Xie Zhenye, Wu Zhiqiang and Tang Xingqiang crossed the finish line for the fourth time with a time of 37.79 seconds. Italy, Great Britain and Canada are in the top three, with China just 0.09 seconds away from the podium.
After the race, Su Bingtian said, "There is still room for performance improvement, playing left a little regret, I hope that the younger generation will continue to carry forward the relay project on this stage, I believe that Chinese sprinters can one day walk on the podium." Su Bingtian did not expect that after seven and a half months, this historic step to the Olympic podium was finally completed by themselves.
On August 12, Uja, a silver medallist from the British team, was temporarily suspended for alleged doping, and the International Doping Testing Agency (ITA) said that two banned substances that helped increase muscle and lose fat were detected from samples taken by Uja after the 4X100m relay at the Tokyo Olympics. After two days of silence, Uja issued a statement on the 14th that he had received a notice before the matter was exposed, and the news broke him and took him several days to digest. Uja also clarified in the statement that "I have never and will never deliberately use any illicit drugs".
Uja (second from right)
But a month later, it published a urine sample from bottle B, which was just as positive as bottle A. This means that it has been determined that Uja's test sample contains prohibited ingredients. Subsequent handling of the issue was transferred from the ITA to the anti-doping department of the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). Due to the pandemic and CAS's litigation schedule, the verdict on Uja was not released until February 18 this year. The Court of Arbitration for Sport issued a public announcement finding that Uja had violated anti-doping rules by disqualifying the British relay team from the men's 4X100m relay final at the Tokyo Olympics and confiscating his medals, certificates, points or prizes. After the verdict was announced, Uja also issued a statement saying that he accepted the verdict and apologized to his teammates.
Announcement by the Court of Arbitration for Sport in the Uja case
After the CAS ruling was announced, according to the relevant rules, the Chinese relay team should be awarded the Olympic bronze medal. Now, this result has finally been officially confirmed by the IAAF. After learning the news, Tang Xingqiang said on his personal social account, "I am very happy to see that the IAAF confirms the reissue of this precious Olympic bronze medal to us." “
Interestingly, when I recalled last year in Tokyo, Su Bingtian also half-jokingly said that he especially wanted to find Gong Lijiao to take a picture of a gold medal, because he had never even seen an Olympic medal. Now, Su Bingtian and his teammates are about to win a medal of great significance in the history of Chinese sprinting, but the question is, when will this bronze medal be sent to the hands of the four members of the Chinese relay team?
In fact, in the history of the Olympic movement, there have been many cases of medals being awarded, but the replacement of Olympic medals needs to go through a set of serious processes, and Gong Lijiao is one of the witnesses. Before winning the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics, Gong Lijiao had won silver and bronze medals at the Olympic Games, but she had never stood on the Olympic podium because the medals were made up. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Gong Lijiao ranked fifth, but the silver and bronze medalists in that competition were found to be doping violations in 2016 and 2017, and Gong Lijiao did not get the bronze medal until 11 years later in 2019; at the 2012 London Olympics, Gong Lijiao ranked fourth. In the same year, the first championship result was cancelled, and Gong Lijiao replaced the bronze medal. 4 years later, the silver medal winner of that year was also disqualified, and Gong Lijiao entered another place and received a silver medal in addition.
Another example is that at the 2016 Rio Olympics, China's "god of war" Lu Xiaojun won the silver medal in the men's 77 kg competition, and the unknown Kazakhstani Rashimov won the championship with a light weight advantage. Earlier last year, more than four years after the Rio Olympics, the ITA announced that Rasimov had been temporarily suspended for allegedly violating doping regulations, that his Rio Olympic gold medal could be cancelled, and that China's famous Lu Xiaojun was expected to earn the gold medal. Now, more than a year has passed, Lu Xiaojun still has not won this gold medal, and everything is still in the process.
From the cases of Gong Lijiao and Lü Xiaojun, it is not difficult to see that the time when the medals are handed has a lot to do with when the offending athletes are found, and even after the verdict is announced, it is still necessary to wait for the International Olympic Committee, individual sports associations and other organizations to complete the complete process, which varies from a few months to several years. However, this "Uja case" took only 7 and a half months to completely close the case, presumably Su Bingtian and his relay team teammates do not have to wait for several years to get the medal like Gong Lijiao.
Of course, from the perspective of athletes, winning medals through re-entry is far from being happy to be on the podium and receiving awards on the spot, but for the continuous improvement of Chinese sprinting, and even Chinese athletics, the bronze medal of the Chinese relay team will eventually leave a strong mark in the history of Asian athletics.
It is worth mentioning that on the evening of the 21st, the IAAF Integrity Committee officially confirmed that the Russian Olympic athletics women and the London Olympic women's 20 km race walking champion Rushmanova was deprived of the Olympic gold medal due to drug involvement, so that the Chinese athlete Qieyang Shijie will be re-added to get the Olympic gold medal.
In the women's 20 km race walk final at the London 2012 Olympic Games, Cheyang Shijie won the bronze medal, Liu Hong won the fourth place, and the top two were won by Russian Olympic athletes. However, after that, many people, including runner-up Kaniskina, were exposed to the drug ban scandal, And Kanskina's Olympic results were also canceled, and Cheyang Shijie and Liu Hong won silver and bronze medals.
Sister Cheyangsh
Now, the champion Rushmanova has also had problems and has been cancelled the Olympic gold medal, which means that China's Cheyang Shijie will be re-added to the Olympic gold medal. For Sister Cheyangshi, this is the reward of her efforts over the years. It turns out that the really powerful players will not be forgotten!