GB’s Peaty questions Chinese swimmers after relay gold
Adam Peaty has questioned the legitimacy of China’s victory in the men’s 4x100m medley relay, suggesting rival Qin Haiyang “should be out of the sport” over his doping past.
Qin and Sun Jiajun helped their nation claim gold but they were two of 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine prior to the Tokyo Olympics.
They were cleared to compete on the basis of a finding they had unknowingly ingested the drug via contaminated food.
The issue clouded the build-up to Paris 2024 when several stars including Katie Ledecky and Caeleb Dressel expressed their misgivings.
Peaty joined that clamour on the final night of action in the pool, singling out Qin for criticism.
Peaty seemed to reference a New York Times allegation that Qin returned a positive test for a different performance-enhancing drug in 2017 – which was blamed on food contamination at the time – as a reason that he should no longer be allowed to compete.
“For me, if you’ve been on that and you have been ‘contaminated’ twice, I think as an honourable person you should be out of the sport,” Peaty said.
“I don’t want to paint a whole nation or group of people with one brush, I think that’s very unfair. But there have been two cases of it and it’s very disappointing.
“The Americans have been very vocal. We didn’t want to get distracted with that. What I’ve said from the start is that it’s fraud. If you’re cheating, it’s fraud.”
The British relay team finished fourth in the medley relay behind China, the USA and France.
Peaty also failed narrowly in his bid to win three straight 100m breaststroke golds, taking silver behind Italian Nicolo Martinenghi by two hundredths of a second, finding out afterwards he had COVID-19.
Peaty said doping authorities needed to “wake up and do your job”.
“I think we have to have faith in the system. But we also don’t. I think it’s got to be stricter,” he said.
Ahead of the Paris Games, Ledecky said swimmers wanted to see change and openness from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
“They want transparency, they want further answers to the questions that still remain,” she said.
“We’re not the ones paid to do the testing. So we hope that the people that are following their own rules and that applies now and into the future.
“We want to see some change for the future so that you don’t have to ask us that question.”
Australian Olympic Committee president Ian Chesterman said he was comfortable with the outcome of the probe into the 23 Chinese swimmers.
“The athletes need to have confidence in the system so I think it was really important that that independent review took place,” Chesterman said.
“The independent review took place by a very senior person, they had access to the facts … we need to accept that and we need to now move on.”
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