Kamila Valieva could have ingested the drug which caused her positive drugs test from drinking from her grandfather’s glass.
That was the improbable ‘contamination’ theory put to the 15-year old skater’s disciplinary hearing by her mother Alsu, an Olympic official has confirmed.
She claimed that Kamila’s grandfather, who has an artificial heart and takes the drug Trimetazidine, could have drunk something and “left traces of his saliva” in a glass which his granddaughter then used.
“Her argument was this contamination happened with a product her grandfather was taking,” said Denis Oswald, Permanent Chair of the International olympic Committee’s Disciplinary Commission.
Even Pravda, Russia’s oldest news website, cast doubt on that explanation and quoted three-time Olympic pairs skating champion turned politician Irina Rodnina as describing the Valieva Affair as a “huge scandal for our sport”.
Rodnina continued: "And most importantly, we don’t know what the consequences will be. Why is Russia so disliked? I have another question: why does Russia make so many mistakes.
“How many medals have we lost because of doping? About 40 medals!”
Valieva begins her individual skating programme today admitting to exhaustion caused by the stress of her predicament.
“These days have been very hard for me, there are not enough emotions,” she said. “I am very happy, but I am enormously tired.
“There are tears of happiness and grief a little.
“I was there (at the hearing) for seven hours. We had one break for 20 minutes and I was sitting and watching. It was very difficult. Apparently, this is one of the stages I have to go through.”
Sympathy for her was in short supply from American sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson, who missed the Tokyo Olympics after accepting a one-month ban following a positive test for cannabis.
Richardson accused doping chiefs of double standards, tweeting: "Can we get a solid answer on the difference of (Valieva's) situation and mines?
"My mother died and I can't run and was also favoured to place top 3. The only difference I see is I'm a black young lady."
Richardson, 21, questioned why it took so long Valieva’s test result to be made known and added that cannabis was not even a performance-enhancing drug.
"Failed in December and the world just now know,” she tweeted of the Russian’s case. “However my resulted was posted within a week and my name & talent was slaughtered to the people.
"Not one BLACK athlete has been about to compete with a case going on, I don't care what they say!!! It’s all in the skin.”
Another poor day for medal-less Team GB saw James Woods withdraw injured without starting snowboard's Big Air.
Kirsty Muir and Katy Summerhayes performed well but had to settle for eighth and ninth in a high-class freeski slopestyle competition.
Eileen Gu, aka China’s Snow Princess, produced a stunning final jump to take silver behind Switzerland's Mathilde Gremaud, days after winning gold in Big Air.
