(Beijing) Russian skater Kamila Valieva, who tested positive for a banned substance at the end of December, was authorized on Monday to participate in the individual event of the Beijing Olympics on Tuesday, announced the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Updated at 1:05 a.m.
The sports court confirmed the lifting of the provisional suspension of the 15-year-old teenager by the Russian anti-doping agency (Rusada), considering that depriving her of a test before even having examined the merits of the case would cause her a “irreparable” harm.
The women’s short program is scheduled to start at 6 p.m. local on Tuesday and Valieva, who became the first skater to land quadruple jumps in Olympic history during team competition a week ago, is scheduled to skate at 9:52 p.m. local .
The Russian teenager, fifteen years old and a pure product of the factory of champions of the severe Eteri Tutberidze in Moscow, was caught up in an embarrassing doping affair in the middle of the Beijing Games.
Seized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in particular, the CAS heard the parties for six hours until early morning Monday by videoconference.
“You have to remember that there is a human dimension in [cette affaire] with a 15-year-old person, ”said Christophe Dubi, the executive director of the Olympic Games, on Sunday.
Controlled on December 25 at the Russian Championships in Saint Petersburg by the Russian anti-doping agency (Rusada), Valieva’s positive result was not known until Tuesday, the day after her shared victory with the Russians in the event. by teams, whose medal ceremony has still not taken place.
The offending product is trimetazidine, used to treat angina pectoris and banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) since 2014, because it promotes blood circulation.
Temporarily suspended by Rusada at first, Valieva obtained the lifting of this sanction the next day.
This led the IOC, but also WADA and the International Skating Federation to appeal.
Since the formalization of her positive control on Friday, Valieva had continued to train conscientiously day after day, sometimes on the Olympic ice, sometimes on the training rink.