Ruling in doping case set to give biathlon star gold medal 15 years after Vancouver Olympics

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Almost 15 years after the Vancouver Olympics, a ruling by sport’s highest court in a Russian doping case is set to give French biathlon star Martin Fourcade another gold medal.

The International Biathlon Union said Tuesday that the Court of Arbitration for Sport dismissed an appeal by Evgeny Ustyugov, who crossed the line first ahead of Fourcade in the 15-kilometer mass start event at the 2010 Winter Games.

The Russian biathlete had appealed against an October 2020 ruling by a CAS tribunal that he was guilty of blood doping detected in his biological passport.

The CAS appeal judges upheld the original verdict, which banned Ustyugov for four years and disqualified all his results from January 2010 through the end of the 2014 season. He also took a bronze medal with the Russian team in the men’s relay in Vancouver.

Though Ustyugov can pursue a further appeal to the Swiss supreme court on limited procedural grounds, the duty of reallocating the Vancouver medals could now go to the International Olympic Committee’s executive board.

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Fourcade is set to be upgraded to gold, Pavol Hurajt of Slovakia should get silver and Christoph Sumann of Austria should move up to get bronze. After the IOC reallocates the medals, they could be presented at a ceremony during the 2026 Milan-Cortina d’Ampezzo Olympics.

Fourcade’s silver in Vancouver was the first of seven medals in his storied Olympic career. He went on to win two golds at the 2014 Sochi Winter Games and three more in Pyeongchang in 2018, including the 15-kilometer mass start.

Fourcade has since moved on to Olympic politics. He was elected in 2022 to be an IOC member by fellow athletes, was part of the organizing committee of the 2024 Paris Olympics and is widely expected to have a big role in organizing the 2030 Winter Games in the French Alps and Nice.

The 39-year-old Ustyugov, who is now retired from racing, has ongoing legal challenges against doping sanctions, the IBU said Tuesday.

He has filed an appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal against a separate CAS judgment in February 2020 which disqualified his results at the 2014 Sochi Olympics.

Ustyugov was part of the men’s relay team at their home Winter Games that won gold ahead of Germany, Austria and Norway. The IOC has been unable yet to reallocate those medals.

That doping case, the biathlon governing body said, was based on data recovered from the Moscow testing laboratory that was shuttered during the scandal of Russian state-backed doping at Sochi and other Olympics.