Disgraced Chinese swimmer Sun Yang wiped from history books

Disgraced Chinese swimmer Sun Yang could do nothing as his name was officially rubbed out of the record books in Paris.

Disgraced Chinese swimmer Sun Yang has officially been wiped from the record books on Monday (AEST).

The three-time Olympic gold medallist, who missed out on competing in Paris due to his doping suspension, had to watch on as a long standing world record was snatched away from him.

The 32-year-old athlete was helpless as American Bobby Finke obliterated his 12-year-old world record in the 1500m freestyle event.

Finke defended his 1500m Olympic title in emphatic fashion with Gregorio Paltrinieri and Daniel Wiffen nowhere near him over the final 100m.

He touched the wall in a blistering time of 14:30.67 as Yang’s previous world record of 14:31.02 was wiped from history.

Finke’s win was also America’s first gold medal by a male swimmer in an individual event at the Paris Olympics.

It’s Bobby’s world now. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)

Sorry Sun, the record is no longer yours. (Photo by Manan VATSYAYANA / AFP)

Sun missed out on a chance to compete at the Paris Games with his doping suspension not ending until May, after the Chinese national championships had taken place.

Sun was suspended for eight years by the World Anti-Doping Agency in 2020 after smashing vials of blood during a 2018 doping test.

He was banned for three months in 2014 for a separate doping offence, but has always protested his innocence in the murky events of September 2018.

He succeeded in reducing the ban after appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, but the ban remained in place for four-years and three-months.

Sun Yang hopes to return to the pool soon. (Photo by Manan VATSYAYANA / AFP)

The Chinese swimmer has expressed an interest in returning to competition “as soon as possible”.

However, if he hopes to reclaim his 1500m Olympic record, he would be 36-years-old when the 2028 Olympics are held in Los Angeles.

“I hope that I’ll be able to pick a competition and return to the starting block as soon as possible,” Sun said in an interview published by state-run media outlet The Paper after his doping ban came to an end in May.

Ahead of the Olympics getting underway, China was thrust into the spotlight with the swim team implicated in a major doping scandal.

Twenty-three Chinese swimmers tested positive for the heart drug trimetazidine (TMZ) — which can enhance performance — ahead of the pandemic-delayed 2021 Tokyo Games, it emerged in April.

Zhang Yufei was one of the 23 Chinese athletes. (Photo by Adam Pretty/Getty Images)

They were not sanctioned after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) accepted the argument of Chinese authorities that the positive tests were caused by food contamination.

Chinese officials tested Australian beef as they tried to establish the source of how two of the country’s swimmers tested positive to a banned substance.

China told the World Anti-Doping Agency it believed two swimmers, Tang Muhan and He Junyi, ate contaminated burgers at a Beijing fast food restaurant in October 2022.

Both returned positive samples for “trace amounts” of metandienone – a banned steroid known for use in meat production.

Australia’s meat industry has hit back at suggestions its products could be to blame, with Meat and Livestock Australia saying metandienone “is not used in any capacity in Australian beef production or in any veterinary medicine.”