Tradie doping official claim won’t sway swimmer Sun Yang’s drug case
Officials have rubbished claims that controversial Chinese swimmer Sun Yang’s doping case against an eight-year ban could hinge on the fact one of the doping officials is a builder.
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Anti-doping bosses have shrugged off revelations one of Sun Yang’s drug testers was a humble tradie as a smokescreen that won’t count in his favour when his future is decided.
The doping case against controversial Chinese swimmer Sun Yang took another bizarre twist after one of the drug testers claimed he was a construction worker with no anti-doping training or experience, according to fresh claims.
It comes as British Olympic champion Adam Peaty rubbished Sun’s claims he was standing up for the rights of other athletes when he smashed his samples with a hammer, telling the fiery Chinese that the swimming community isn’t buying it.
Sun is fighting for his sporting future following a Court of Arbitration for Sport hearing last week in Geneva where the World Anti-Doping Agency appealed a FINA decision not to sanction him for his part in smashing a vial of blood during a test at his home in 2018.
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According to Chinese state media outlet Xinhua, one of the three doping control testers — who spoke on the condition of anonymity — said he was a construction worker who only went along to Sun’s house on the night of September 4, 2018 to help a school friend.
“I am a builder and I am always busy at work, day and night. No one ever trained me about the doping test, and it is unnecessary for me to undertake such training,” the anonymous source said.
But chaperones do not require any special certification because their main role is to observe the athlete urinating so their day job is irrelevant.
There are guidelines on how they should behave while carrying out their duties and WADA did agree that the chaperone who attended Sun’s out-of-competition test should not have asked the swimmer for a photo. But WADA cited previous cases where that was not sufficient grounds for the test not to proceed.
“She called me to pick up her at the railway station and drove her to Sun’s home at that night,” the source said of his doping control officer friend.
“In fact, there was another lady with the DCO (doping control officer) at the station. She was the BCA (blood collection assistant).
“Before we entered the test room, the DCO asked me to escort Sun into the bathroom. As my understanding, she was asking me to watch Sun Yang urinating. Because both of them were ladies, I agreed.
“Sun is a big star in China and it was my first time being near him. I was excited. I took a couple of pictures outside the room with my cellphone. When I tried to take pictures of him again when we were sitting in the room, Sun told me not to do so.
“Then he asked every one of us to identify ourselves. I showed my ID card. Sun pointed out that I was not an accredited tester and should not stay in the test room.”
According to Xinhua, the man said he had supplied written testimony to both CAS and WADA but heard nothing in reply. It now remains to be seen whether that evidence will be taken into evidence given the man never heard back from the world doping body, and did not attend the CAS hearing.
It’s up to the three independent arbitrators to decide the verdict with the outcome hinging on whether or not the drug testers were authorised to conduct the tests. WADA maintains they were while Sun’s lawyers claim they weren’t.
Peaty, one of Sun’s most vocal critics, said it was laughable that Sun was now trying to justify himself by saying he was acting in the best interests of his fellow competitors.
“That’s an absolute joke,” Peaty told The Daily Telegraph.
“That’s probably what his lawyers told him to say, he’s probably got some great PR support.
“But I don’t believe a word that comes out of his mouth.”
Sun first made the claim he was championing the rights of other athletes after the tide began to turn against him when Mack Horton and Duncan Scott refused to join him on the medal podium at this year’s world championships in South Korea.
Both Horton and Scott were greeted by standing ovations from other international swimmers when they returned to the athlete’s village after their races as Sun exploded and screamed at Scott: “you loser, I’m winning”.
Peaty said the views of most swimmers hadn’t changed one bit despite Sun’s insistence he was in their corner.
“If you went around each athlete in each country and asked them ‘would you support Sun Yang in this current situation?”, I’m pretty sure 95% or 99% would say absolutely no way,” he said.
“I remember when Duncan came back to the room, all the countries were clapping him for standing up to Sun Yang so he can’t just turn around and say ‘I’m fighting for athlete’s rights.’
“It doesn’t work like that. You don’t have serious allegations like that against you and turn around and go ‘I’m actually fighting for you guys.’
“This is just him trying to swing the story.”
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Sun faces a ban of up to eight years if found guilty though his critics say his reputation will never be restored regardless of the decision.
He has already been frozen out of the sport’s new professional league because he has a prior doping conviction and Peaty said he would never be invited to join because he already has a prior doping conviction from 2014.
“Doping is one of the biggest threats to any sport because once you lose that fan base and they think what they’re seeing isn’t real then you’ve lost them forever,” Peaty said.
“Over the (northern hemisphere) summer, there was obviously a lot of doping allegations that were drowning out the success stories we need to be celebrating so we need to get rid of all the rubbish dopers.”
Originally published as Tradie doping official claim won’t sway swimmer Sun Yang’s drug case
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