IOC dismayed after doping bans on 28 Russian athletes overturned by Cas

The International Olympic Committee has reacted with dismay after 28 Russian athletes had their lifetime bans from the Olympics dramatically overturned by the court of arbitration for sport and warned that the ruling could have serious consequences for the fight against doping.

As Russia’s sports ministry celebrated the decision, saying that “justice had finally triumphed”, the IOC was bracing itself for a fresh legal challenge from some of the athletes who now want to compete in the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang which begin next Friday.

Cas’s ruling also means the 28 will have their results reinstated from the 2014 Winter Olympics, returning Russia to the top of the medal table. They include the skeleton medallists Alexander Tretyakov and Elena Nikitina, who have already indicated they want to compete in Pyeongchang.

British IOC member Adam Pengilly said he was “appalled and angry” at the decision, adding that it was “a desperate and dark day for sport, with cheats and thieves allowed to triumph.”

“We need to take a long, hard look at sport’s leading administrators and sport’s legal system when we see the greatest fraud at an Olympic Games and years of institutional doping conspiracy pass by with only minor punishment,” he said.

“Today I have found myself apologising to individual athletes who have had dreams, medals, money and most importantly, faith in sport, stolen from them. They now think that you are better off cheating or getting your nation to establish a doping system because even if it is discovered, the consequences are minimal. Or, if you don’t want to cheat, avoid elite sport like the plague.”

The ROC remains suspended from Pyeongchang because of state-sponsored doping in Sochi. However, as things stand, around 160 Russians have been granted permission to compete as “neutral” athletes under the banner of Olympic Athlete from Russia after being cleared of doping by an IOC anti-doping panel.

That figure could yet rise, although for now the IOC is insisting it will not automatically allow any of the Russians cleared by Cas late entry into the Games. “The result of the Cas decision does not mean that athletes from the group of 28 will be invited,” it said in a statement. “Not being sanctioned does not automatically confer the privilege of an invitation.”

The IOC was also unusually critical of Cas’s ruling, suggesting the court had not taken enough account of evidence of “the proven existence of the systematic manipulation of the anti-doping system” at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

Much of the evidence was provided by Grigory Rodchenkov, the former head of Russian anti-doping, who detailed how he gave cocktails of banned steroids to athletes and then swapped tainted samples for clean urine on orders from Russian officials.

His testimony – along with thousands of supporting documents and statements from other whistleblowers – led to the Russian Olympic Committee being suspended in December and 43 Russians being given life bans from the Olympics after an IOC investigation led by Denis Oswald. At the time the IOC president, Thomas Bach, called it an “unprecedented attack on the integrity of the Olympic Games and sport”.

However, on Thursday Cas ruled there was insufficient evidence to prove beyond doubt the 28 Russians had each committed an anti-doping rule violation.

“The Cas required an even higher threshold on the necessary evidence than the Oswald Commission and former Cas decisions,” the IOC said in a statement. “This may have a serious impact on the future fight against doping.”

The news was also greeted with frustration by Jim Walden, the lawyer for Rodchenkov, who remains in hiding after fleeing Russia in 2015.

“Dr Rodchenkov testified fully and credibly at Cas,” he said. “His truth has been verified by forensic evidence, other whistleblowers and, more recently, recovery of the Moscow lab’s secret database, showing thousands of dirty tests that were covered up.

“This panel’s unfortunate decision provides a very small measure of punishment for some athletes but a complete ‘get out of jail free card’ for most. Thus, the Cas decision only emboldens cheaters, makes it harder for clean athletes to win, and provides yet another ill-gotten gain for the corrupt Russian doping system generally, and [Vladimir] Putin specifically.”

Another 11 Russians were convicted of having committed anti-doping rule violations in Sochi by Cas but had their life bans cut to a ban from the Pyeongchang Games alone. Among them were members of the Russian four-man bobsleigh team that won medals in Sochi – meaning the GB team, which originally finished fifth, will be promoted into the bronze-medal position.

Philippe Bärtsch, a lawyer for Russian athletes, said the high salt levels in the 11 athletes’ samples were accepted as evidence of tampering.

Of the 43 Russian athletes banned by the IOC Maxim Belugin, a bobsleigher, was the only one not to lodge an appeal with Cas. Three other cases – biathletes Olga Zaytseva, Olga Vilukhina and Yana Romanova – have yet to be heard.

Match TV, a Kremlin-funded sport channel, celebrated the court’s decision by broadcasting in full the almost two-hour-long men’s 50km freestyle cross-country skiing competition from the Sochi Olympics, in which Russia swept the podium. The TV channel also described the ruling as a “bang on the nose” for the IOC.

In a statement explaining its decision Cas said its panels had looked at individual cases and not whether state-sponsored doping had taken place.