Kamila Valieva, the Russian skater at the center of a doping controversy at the Beijing Winter Olympics says she must have accidentally swallowed her grandfather’s heart medication after failing a drug test. The bizarre defense emerged as the 15-year-old Russian athlete prepared to skate in today’s individual short program.
“Her argument was this contamination… happened with a product her grandfather was taking,” IOC member Dennis Oswald, who heads the IOC disciplinary commission, told reporters in Beijing, according to the Associated Press.
Valieva’s defense became even weirder when her lawyer explained how it could have happened.
The skater’s lawyer, Anna Kozmenko, told a Russian Anti-Doping Agency hearing last week that Valieva’s grandfather takes the drug trimetazidine for heart issues and there were various ways it could have got into her body: “For example, (her) grandfather drank something from a glass, saliva got in (and) this glass was somehow later used by the athlete.”
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The argument was reported by The Dossier Center, a website run by the exiled Russian businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky, according to USA Today.
On Monday, the IOC announced that a medal ceremony would not be held if Valieva finishes in the top three due to concerns that she could still be banned.
