The Liars Fold: Russia Vindicated Once Again

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Surprise, surprise… the International Olympic Committee (IOC) lamented there’s “insufficient” evidence of Russian doping. We live for these moments. As they say in America:

A lie gets halfway to Wal-Mart before the truth has a chance to put its Crocs on.

Yes, it’s finally happened. The truth finally caught up with the World Anti-Doping Agency and its International Olympic Committee pals. The IOC admitted that Richard McLaren’s 2016 report on the alleged use of doping by Russian athletes “isn’t sufficient to bring successful cases”. Christophe de Kepper, director-general and member of the IOC Executive Board said in a letter to the organisation:

At the recent meeting (21 February) held by WADA in Lausanne to “provide assistance to IFs [International Federations] regarding how to analyse and interpret the evidence”, WADA admitted that in many cases the evidence provided may not be sufficient to bring successful cases.

Finally, justice… and just in time to allow all Russian athletes to take part in the Rio games…oh, wait. Based on the first part of McLaren’s report published on 18 June 2016, which presented the results of his investigation into alleged doping at the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic Games, WADA recommended that the IOC, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), and all international sporting federations exclude Russia from their competitions. Consequently, the IOC banned the entire Russian Paralympian team from the Rio games. We could spend all day dissecting the McLaren report, but it’s clear that the IOC has already accepted reality… it’s a bad, bad, bad, poorly done politically motivated hit job. If you want the details, you can read this or this or this. Mark Chapman nailed it back in August:

Bullshit. From start to finish. No western athlete would have to put up with a ban on competing just because he or she was American or Canadian or Dutch, and he or she would damned sure not be told to accept a ban where he or she had not even seen the evidence against him or her because it was secret. The McLaren Report doesn’t prove anything it purports to prove, and it won’t stand up to a challenge.

Bingo.

25 February 2017

Matthew Allen

Russian Insider

http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/liars-fold-russia-vindicated-once-again/ri19037   

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There Would Be No Happiness: The Top 5 Surprises From the Russian Team in Rio

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The Olympic Games 2016 in Rio de Janeiro is smoothly transiting into its final stage. Four days remain in medals competition. They decimated the Russian Olympic team, but as it turned out, that only spurred on our athletes. We offer to you the most unexpected successes of our Olympians in Rio.

1. Women’s Archery. Team Championship… Silver

In all the time that our team took part in the Olympics, Russian archers only just got on the podium… Bair Badenov won the bronze at the Beijing Olympics in the men’s singles championships. On 7 August, our girls won a historic silver for Russia in the team competition. Tuyana Dashidorzhieva, Inna Stepanova, and Kseniya Perova lost to the favoured Korean team, having a total score of 5-1 in the three sets. Stepanova said after the finals:

The fact that we made the finals was an achievement for us, but we fought to get there, we tried hard, we went through a lot… through years-long practise, pain, tears… we had to sacrifice a lot.

2. Women’s Air Pistol, 10 Metres. Vitalina Batsarashkina… Silver

We won our last medal in this competition back in 2008 at the Beijing Olympics. Then, Nataliya Paderina won silver. At the Rio Olympics, some had hopes for young 19-year-old Vitalina Batsarashkina, but no one could’ve imagined that at such a young age, she’d be able to win the silver. Batsarashkina told reporters:

Tomorrow, I’m flying home; I’m glad to be going back to my folks. They still haven’t gotten over the shock that I’m going home with a medal.

3. Women’s Sailing, RS-X.Bronze. Stefaniya Elfutina… Bronze

In this sport, Russian sportsmen haven’t had even one success in the last 20 years. In Rio, there wasn’t much hope, but the 19-year-old Stefaniya Elfutina managed to surprise everyone by winning the bronze in windsurfing. Now, Russian fans have a reason to watch the sailing competitions… finally, we have somebody capable of winning a medal.

4. Men’s Single Kayak, 1000 Meteres. Roman Anoshkin… Bronze

For Russia, even reaching the finals in this sport is already a success, but our rower scored a “splash” in the semi-finals, showing the best time in his class. In the final, Anoshkin, a native of Omsk Oblast, achieved unprecedented success, winning the bronze. He was the first Russian athlete in 44 years to stand on the Olympic podium in the singles rowing competition. Anoshkin told us after the finish:

In general, I didn’t expect to win a medal, but I wanted to do it, so, I’m very happy. Somehow, I failed to take the lead from the start, I had to lay back in the pack, but early in the second half, I started speeding up and catching up. We had a later start than others did, which gave me a total time good enough to win.

5. Women’s Tennis, Doubles. Vesnina/Makarova… Gold

The Russian tennis players winning the gold didn’t come as a surprise, they were amongst the favourites even before the games began. However, one thing was surprising… our girls didn’t lose a single set in the tournament! Bravo! Despite the fact that the duo of Makarova and Vesnina has long been a byword in world tennis, the Olympic championship eluded them. Besides that, until now, Russian tennis players only won the singles at the Olympics. Vesnina said:

We really had a very difficult path here in Rio. We wanted to come here as soon as possible to prepare, to get better used to the courts, but it didn’t turn out that way. Nevertheless, this even helped us to some extent; after all, we’re ready for unforeseen situations. Once here, nothing distracted us from our goal. We didn’t worry about the food or anything else.

18 August 2016

RIA Novosti

http://ria.ru/olympics2016/20160818/1474706976.html

22 July 2016. The Anglos Tut About Russian “Doping”

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The Russian track-and-field athletes won’t be at the Rio Olympics. The Yanks and their obedient baying hounds accuse them of doping. I seem to notice that drug use is very common amongst American athletes… but the US team isn’t getting the boot! The USA is trying to hurt Russia (and China) in whatever ways it can, both major and minor. It does tell you much about “exceptional” Americans, doesn’t it? They think themselves “indispensable”… they truly do, I’m not jesting or joking in the least. They’re so “great” that the only way that they can win is to eliminate one of the world’s strongest teams.

“Make America Great Again”… to do that, it had to have been great in the past. I’d say that the Trail of Tears and Hiroshima put that assessment very much in doubt…

BMD

11 April 2014. RIA-Novosti Infographics. The Chronicle of the Ancient Olympic Games in Classical Greece

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Editor:

As for me, I favour the reintroduction of the pankration to the Olympics. Trust me, it’d become the most popular event, no question about it. Could you see heavyweight pankratists go at it? Now, THAT’S sport! Alas, we live in wimpy times… squash has a better chance of being part of the Olympics than the pankration has… damn, it’d be a prole sport to beat the band, wouldn’t it?

8 February 2014

RIA-Novosti

http://en.ria.ru/sochi2014_mm/20140208/187228201/Chronicle-of-the-Ancient-Olympic-Games.html