As the cream of world swimming limbers up for the World Championships in South Korea, explosive doping allegations against Chinese giant Sun Yang could overshadow events in the pool.
Americans are expected to dominate the medals once again, with swimming glitterati Caeleb Dressel and Katie Ledecky leading their charge for gold.
However, the specter of another damaging doping scandal looms after a leaked International Swimming Federation (FINA) doping panel report appeared to confirm rumors that the sport’s villain smashed blood samples with a hammer after testers visited him in September last year.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Sun, a nine-time world champion and the only swimmer to win Olympic gold over 200m, 400m and the 1,500m freestyle, clashed with Mack Horton at Rio in 2016, when the Australian called him a “drug cheat” over a prior three-month suspension for using a banned stimulant.
The revelations in the report have stirred a hornet’s nest likely to trigger more salty reactions from athletes over the next week.
“Hopefully there will be no problems,” FINA executive director Cornel Marculescu said. “It’s difficult to say, but I don’t think it’s going to have an influence on the swimmers.”
After the World Anti-Doping Agency appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, Sun faces a possible lifetime ban if found guilty at a hearing set to convene in September.
Any public row would further embarrass FINA at a World Championships whose slogan, “Dive into Peace,” runs alongside posters of South Korean swimmer Park Tae-hwan, who himself has served a lengthy doping ban.
Those not caught up in the Sun storm will be looking to build confidence in the dress rehearsal for next year’s Tokyo Olympics.
US swimmers plundered 18 gold, 10 silver and 10 bronze medals in 2017, with Britain (4-1-2) a distant second and Russia (3-3-4) third.
Dressel ruled the pool in Budapest, becoming only the second swimmer to capture seven gold medals at a single World Championships after Michael Phelps in 2007.
The 100m butterfly title appears Dressel’s to lose, but he will find his 100m freestyle crown harder to cling to.
Olympic champion Kyle Chalmers looks a good bet in the men’s blue riband event, and some sizzling performances in the run-in suggest he could even threaten Brazilian Cesar Cielo’s 10-year-old world record of 46.91 seconds.
Australia flopped in 2017, but have brought a leaner, meaner team to South Korea led by Chalmers and Cate Campbell, who is chasing a freestyle sprint double.
Swedish star Sarah Sjostrom, reigning world and Olympic champion in the 100m butterfly and world record holder over one and two laps of free, is to have a say in the shakedown for medals.
Britain’s Adam Peaty takes aim at his own world record in the 100m breaststroke as he tries to extend a five-year unbeaten run over two laps in major competitions.
Former world No. 2 Paula Badosa has withdrawn from this week’s Wuhan Open, organizers said on Tuesday, amid a racism row over an online photograph. Tournament organizers said the Spaniard had pulled out of the WTA 1000 tournament, citing a gastrointestinal illness, hours before her first-round match against Australian Ajla Tomljanovic. News outlets including Britain’s the Telegraph earlier reported that Badosa had posted a photo on Instagram in which she appeared to imitate a Chinese face by placing chopsticks on the corners of her eyes. The photo was taken last week in a restaurant in Beijing, where she reached the semi-finals of the
Shin Oebori coaches the Fukagawa Hawks youth baseball team in Tokyo, and he is very aware how Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani touches his players. “With Ohtani, the kids think everything is possible,” Oebori said, wrapping up practice yesterday on an all-dirt field set alongside a local Buddhist temple, below an elevated highway, and in the shadow of tall apartment blocks in central Tokyo. “Nothing is impossible with him. A dream is not a dream,” Oebori said, stepping out of the fenced practice field that keeps balls from landing on the temple grounds. None of the players hitting sponge-soft baseball has reached
CRICKET Azhar’s 59 leads Stallions Aashir Azhar’s blazing half-century guided the Taipei Stallions to victory over Taipei Super 11 in the Taiwan Premier League’s Group A at the Yingfeng Cricket Ground in Taipei yesterday. The Stallions were 102-3 and into the 12th over of 20 when Azhar came to the crease. He hit seven sixes and two fours in the 25 deliveries he faced to push his side to 171-5. Gokul Kumar was the star with the ball for Super 11, taking 3-17. In the reply, Deepak Vishnu outscored Azhar with 77 from 50 balls, but nobody else got past 20 as
‘GLOBAL PRESSURE’: LA’s Dave Roberts said that it was difficult to appreciate the ‘pressure on a global scale’ his starter was under ‘pitching for his country’ The Los Angeles Dodgers shelled out US$1 billion for Japanese talent in the off-season and it is paying off in the MLB playoffs. Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Friday outdueled Yu Darvish in a historic post-season matchup of Japanese-born starters, while the Dodgers got home runs from Kike Hernandez and Teoscar Hernandez to beat the San Diego Padres 2-0 and advance to the National League Championship Series. “It’s pretty sweet,” a smiling Freddie Freeman said. Yamamoto allowed two hits over five innings for the win, getting pulled after 63 pitches in a decisive Game 5 between heated NL West rivals who were meeting in a
RSS