|
 |   |
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Multimedia Central Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities Work in Sports
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
|  |
Minimum punishment for Raducan - Rogge
Gallois SYDNEY, Sept 26 (AFP) - Romanian gymnast Andreea Raducan, stripped of the gold medal she won in the individual women's overall category, has been punished on principle but her charactar remains unstained, senior International Olympic Committee (IOC) member Jacques Rogge told AFP Tuesday. "The young girl is not to blame but the grave negligence of her doctor who has furthermore admitted he made a mistake in prescribing a medicine for a cold," said Rogge, a member of the IOC Executive Committee. "We had to take her medal away because, even involuntarily, she broke a rule and was benefiting from an advantage. But all she did was make an error. Like an athlete who makes a false start," the Belgian said. "We applied the minimum penalty. We have not excluded her from the Games as we have in other doping cases. Nor have we asked her federation to inflict a suspension on her and she keeps the other two medals she won," Rogge explained. On September 19 she won the overall team's gold medal, two days later she lifted the overall individual title and on September 24 she finished second in the vault. Rogge confirmed that Raducan was not one of the two members of the Romanian team selected for a dope test after the team event. But on September 21 she was tested - as are all individual medallists - and the result showed the presence of pseudo-ephedrine. On the 24th after her silver medal she passed the mandatory dope test. She showed a 90 nanogram level per millilitre of blood which surpasses the legal minimum of 25. Rogge believed the fact that the diminutive Raducan weighed only 37kg may have partially explained the high level of the dose. "Her doctor prescribed her Neurofen. But there are three varieties (of Neurofen): two are allowed under IOC rules and a third which contains psuedo-ephedrine and which is banned. It was that one which was unfortunately administered," explained Rogge. The doctor has been banned from the Sydney Olympics and will also be excluded from the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City and the 2004 Summer Games in Athens. Rogge explained that it was not the first time that a doctor had been banned from the Olympics, explaining that a Soviet medic had been expelled from the 1976 Winter Games at Innsbruck, Austria and at the 1996 Atlanta Games a doctor from a Baltic country had been expelled after admitting proescribing EPO.
|
