Australian swimmer Brenton Rickard returns positive for a banned diuretic at 2012 London Olympics
Australia has never lost an Olympic medal as a result of a doping case, but that could be all about to change.
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Former world breaststroke champion Brenton Rickard is appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport against a positive drug test that threatens to have him and five of his Australian relay teammates from the 2012 London Olympic swim team stripped of their bronze medal.
Rickard on Friday emailed his teammates on the 4x100m medley relay squad informing them that his sample he provided on August 1, 2012 had been retested eight years later and showed a small concentration of the masking agent, furosemide.
The new testing failed to disclose any underlying prohibited performance-enhancing substance.
That was enough for the International Olympic Committee’s disciplinary commission to find him guilty, at which point the matter was referred to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.
The hearing is set down for next Monday and if the finding goes against him the expectation is that the entire squad could be stripped of their bronze medal, even though Rickard himself only swam in the heats, not the final.
Informed sources have told The Weekend Australian that it is up to the individual sports to determine whether an entire relay team is punished or whether only the swimmer who tested positive is stripped of his medal.
It is understood that swimming will see the entire team stripped, as was US track legend Michael Johnson and his 4x400m relay teammates from the 2000 Olympics after teammate Antonio Pettigrew admitted during a trial that he had used performance-enhancing drugs at those Games.
Because the matter is now in the hands of CAS, neither the Australian Olympic Committee nor Swimming Australia would comment.
It was a devastating way for dual Olympic gold 1500m freestyle medallist Kieren Perkins to begin his first day as Swimming Australia president.
“I can’t make any comment but I can say that Swimming Australia will be offering Brenton any support he may want at this time,” Perkins said.
But it may be Rickard’s relay teammates, James Magnussen, Matt Targett, Christian Sprenger, Hayden Stoeckel and Tomasso D’Orsogna who may need most help, given that they are the completely innocent victims of this situation.
The first four named swimmers competed in the final while D’Orsogna and Rickard only swam in the heats.
The London Olympic swim team is, sadly, the team that keeps on giving for the AOC and the Swimming Australia.
Magnussen, Targett and D’Orsongna were three of six members of the men’s relay sprint squad who were fined and given suspended sentences by Swimming Australia after being involved in a controversial bonding session before the London Games.
The swimmers, along with Eamon Sullivan, James Roberts and Cameron MvEvoy were all disciplined after the Games for using a drug specifically banned by the AOC, Stilnox, prior to the bonding session.
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The incident also helped speed the demise of the popular Leigh Nugent as head coach of the swim team and paved the way for an outsider, Dutchman Jacco Verhaeren to be appointed boss of the Dolphins for the 2016 Rio Olympics and beyond.
In his email, Rickard described the situation as being his “worst nightmare” and begged his teammates for their forgiveness.
“I am truly sorry to have to inform you of this shocking situation,” Rickard wrote in the email. “I expect the matter will become public imminently so I wanted to inform you in advance of this and convey to you my strong conviction of my innocence and commitment to protesting the disqualification of the 4x100m medley result.”
Geoff Huegill, a former Australian teammate of Rickard’s who was wrong identified in some publications as having been part of the medley relay team, said his gut reaction to the positive test was one of shock.
“I think, knowing Rickard, it’s not in his nature (to be a drug cheat),” Huegill said. “It’s out of character for this situation to occur.
“But I don’t know the full details of what type of medication it was or when it was taken. It could have been a fungal cream or a Panadol or an antihystamine.”
Australia has never lost an Olympic medal because of a positive drug test and they may do so now only because the statute of limitations for drug-testing was lifted from eight years to 10 years in 2015.
Ironically, in the hours before the story broke, Perkins had given an exclusive to The Weekend Australian about becoming Swimming Australia during which he spoke of the difficulties that positive drug tests presented to the sport. While he did not name names, it is clear he was thinking of the nightmare into which Shayna Jack has been thrown as a result of her positive drug test. A year and a half later her case is still unresolved.
“It is easy to get outraged when you assume you have the answer to something but the issue with drugs in sport is that you are guilty until you are proven innocent,” Perkins said.
There is no other realm of civil society where that is the case
“In sport, the minute you have a positive test, which is an indicator of a potential offence, you are immediately banned and you are immediately removed from the sport and you are immediately cut off. That is a deeply difficult and traumatic thing to navigate.
“Where I think we and swimming more broadly and the drugs judicial and investigative process is not doing well at the moment is that we are not acting fact enough.”