The former director of Russia's national anti-doping laboratory Grigory Rodchenkov has made astounding revelations in his interview with Play the Game web media. He has claimed that an alleged state-backed doping program, that supposedly helped Russian athletes win the Sochi Olympics existed in a more crude way during the previous Games that the then Soviet Union hosted, the 1980 Moscow Olympics.
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According to him, the KGB helped the lab, where he was working, to change positive samples with "clean" ones during the Olympic Games. There is just one inconsistency here — Rodchenkov joined the anti-doping agency in 1985, which is 5 years after the competition in Moscow.
Russian Twitter users, obviously already bored with his "revelations," which have become more and more dire over time, started guessing what he will announce next.
"Rodchenkov said that during the Olympics in 776 B.C.E. in Moscow a state-sponsored doping system existed," a user named VeteranOMON wrote.
"Rodchenkov, who didn't work at the lab in 1980, said that Soviet athletes were using doping and were aided by the KGB," the user, named marinochka_san, wrote.
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Armen Gasparyan, a prominent Russian media figure, historian and activist, suggested that his next statement will focus the UEFA championship.
"Finally! Rodchenkov found doping at the Moscow Olympics in 1980. Next one will be UEFA championship in 1960," he wrote in his Twitter.
Russian activist Maria Katasonova suggested that new set of anti-Russian sanctions won't keep us waiting too long.
"Rodchenkov claims a doping system existed during the Moscow Olympics in 1980 and that KGB representative was always present in the lab and helped to change the samples. WHERE WAS PUTIN WORKING IN 1980?! WE DESPERATELY NEED A NEW SET OF SANCTIONS," she wrote on her Twitter account.
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Grigory Rodchenkov told The New York Times that at least 16 Russian Sochi Olympics winners were a part of an alleged state-backed doping program in 2016. His testimonies, always growing with ever new details, served as the basis for the WADA independent investigation into the activities at the Moscow anti-doping center. It led to a ban of the Russian team from the 2018 Winter Olympics, although "clean" athletes from Russia were allowed under the condition of performing under a neutral flag.
The re-examination of the probes conducted on behalf of the International Olympic Committee led to 11 Russian athletes being deprived of their medals. Russian officials have refuted all allegations on the existence of a state-supported doping system, but acknowledged that country had certain problems with doping and promised to tackle with them.