So that the world of sports would know that the International Olympic Committee means business when it comes to cleaning up the Games of wayward athletes and coaches, it has taken a special interest on the steroid scandal involving yet another Greek athlete.

The IOC has filed a lawsuit against George Panagiotopoulos, coach of former Olympic champion hurdler Fani Halkia. Halkia was one of the six athletes who were disqualified from the Beijing Olympics because of doping violation.

According to IOC’s lawyer Petros Mahas, the organization had already provided its evidence to prosecutors in Greece to bring charges against Panagiotopoulos relating to the country’s anti-doping laws.

“We submitted the lawsuit against Mr Panagiotopoulos and any other responsible parties,” Mahas said. “The IOC’s target is not the athletes, but the coaches who supply them with drugs.”

The 29-year-old Halkia tested for the anabolic steroid methyltrienolone in early August before she headed for Beijing. She could receive a two-year ban from the sport.

And here’s the staggering statistics courtesy of the Greek Olympic team – 19 athletes, including Halkia, had tested positive for banned compounds before and during the Games.

In March, eleven of the 14 Greek weightlifters tested positive also for methyltrienolone in an out-of-competition screening in Athens. If this is not systematic doping, we don’t know what is.

Because of this embarrassing incident the International Weightlifting Federation had reportedly fined the Greek weightlifting federation amounting to $387,000.

Consequently, a Greek prosecutor had filed misdemeanor charges against the eleven athletes, team coach Christos Iakovou and 13 other individuals involved in the doping incident.

Thus, the IOC is now particularly critical of Greek anti-doping programs.

“The IOC wants to actively participate in the fight against doping in Greece,” Mahas added. “It is the first time the IOC requests a country’s legal authorities to investigate the criminal accountability of a trainer who doped athletes.”

From Reuters:

Halkia, an officer in the Greek airforce, has insisted her sample was tampered with. If investigating magistrates find Greek doping laws were violated, she and others could also face criminal charges.

Another of Panagiotopoulos’s runners, sprinter Dimitris Regas, was caught doping weeks before the Beijing Games.

After losing 11 weightlifters, sprinters, a rower and a swimmer due to positive drugs tests in the run-up to the Game, the hosts of the previous Olympics had more athletes banned from than medals won, two silvers and two bronze.

The case brought back bitter memories for the country, still embarrassed that its top two sprinters Katerina Thanou and Costas Kenteris were expelled from the 2004 Olympics after missing a doping test on the eve of the Games.

Tags: doping incident, Fani Halkia, George Panagiotopoulos, Greek Olympic team doping, Greek weightlifting team, methytrienolone, steroids

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The International Weightlifting Federation has announced that the Greek team is allowed to compete at the Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. This in the light of the recent suspension of 11 members of the 14-man national team due to steroid use.

The 11 athletes tested positive for the steroid methyltrienolone during a March out-of-competition test in Athens. The results were made public in April. All the 11 unnamed athletes have been suspended for two years.

The IWF said that the country could send representatives in the sport – three men and a woman – to the Olympics in August. The decision was reached by its board.

In addition, IWF said the Greek weightlifting federation has since been fined reportedly in the amount of 250,000 euros (C$395,000).
In May, a Greek prosecutor filed misdemeanour charges against the 11 athletes, Olympic weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou and 13 others.

Iakovou, 60, is one of Greece’s most notable coaches. Through his coaching abilities, the country has won 12 Olympic medals, which include five gold. He is in suspension since the steroid scandal hit headlines.

The coach denied that he provided his athletes with the steroid, blaming a faulty batch of Chinese diet supplements.

Ten of the 11 accused athletes have supported their coach’s claim. A female athlete, on the other hand, plans to take the legal course against anyone found guilty for giving her steroids, allegedly with her in the dark.

This is not the first case wherein this steroid has figured in a doping scandal. At the height of the above steroid controversy, an English-language newspaper in Greece has reported that methyltrienolone killed 200 bodybuilders back in the 1960s. This claim, however, has been considered “preposterous” and “ludicrous” by many steroid experts.

Methlytrienolone is one of the most potent steroids around. Patrick Arnold, the now infamous BALCO chemist, has confirmed that a number of athletes used this steroid during the 1990s and dodged detection. According to Arnold, this is because methyltrienolone can provide impressive performance enhancing effects even in minute quantities.

Tags: BALCO, Beijing Olympics, Greek weightlifting team, International Weightlifting Federation, methyltrienolone, Patrick Arnold, steroid

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With the opening of Summer Olympics in Beijing just over a hundred days to go; and as the Olympic Torch is being relayed on all continents except Antarctica, the excitement for this big sporting event intensifies by the hour. Simultaneously, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) intensifies its efforts against steroid use.

WADA’s latest ‘trophy’ is the Greek Olympic Weightlifting Team. The surprise testing conducted by WADA, on the behest of the International Weightlifting Federation, has rocked the sports community especially in Greece. Eleven out of the total 14 members of the Greek tem have tested positive of banned substances. It was reported that the 11 professional athletes used trebelone acetate. This steroid is indicated for veterinary use to facilitate muscle growth and improve appetite in livestock and is known to cause severe virilization symptoms. Of the 11 weightlifters, six were women.

If said athletes also test positive for the second round of tests, they might say ta-ta to their chance in joining the Beijing Olympics which will be held come August. Their only recourse is for the Dalai Lama to speak for their cause, which is an improbability considering Tibet and China’s current political scenario.

With this doping scandal is still dominating local media, Greek authorities are undertaking a massive crackdown against steroids. As a result, a staggering amount of more than 90,000 pills of anabolic steroids were seized at an Athens post office on April 14.

Tags: anabolic steroids, Beijing Olympics, doping, Greek weightlifting team, olympics, Thailand steroid industry, WADA

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