Adam Peaty hits out at 'burying' of doping after China win gold
Adam Peaty has criticised the presence of competitors who had previously failed drug tests, as ITV News' Ellie Pitt reports
Adam Peaty has hit out at the "burying" of doping evidence after a Chinese team that featured competitors who had previously failed drug tests won gold.
Qin Haiyang and Sun Jiajun helped their nation claim gold in the men’s 4×100 metres medley relay but they were two of 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine prior to the Tokyo Olympics.
They were later cleared to compete on the basis of a finding they had unknowingly ingested the drug via contaminated food.
Qin also failed a different performance-enhancing drug in 2017 – which was also blamed on food contamination at the time.
Speaking to ITV News, the 29-year-old Team GB swimmer said: "For me, my only thing I care about is making sure I am racing fair people and they're not cheating, so what else I can do is speak out when we know that people are contaminating in very suspicious environments but also that they're doing it twice - it's been buried.
"If there's truly a contamination and they're truly not at fault then why bury it?"
Peaty said one of the biggest problems is a significant amount of the anti-drug measures competitors are placed under are carried out by the home nation.
He said many athletes across numerous sports "feel very let down by the current system" and that needs to change to improve trust and transparency.
The issue heavily overshadowed the build-up to Paris 2024 and appeared to lead to mistrust from several swimmers in the system.
Katie Ledecky and Caeleb Dressel expressed their misgivings and Peaty joined the clamour on the final night of the swimming competitions as he singled out Qin for criticism.
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Peaty's experience at the 2024 Olympics was overshadowed by a positive Covid diagnosis the day after coming second in the men's 100m breaststroke by just 0.02 seconds.
He described on Saturday how he had had the “worst week” of his life physically.
When asked how felt about missing out on gold by such a short distance, he said: "It's all over really."
"Firstly your initial reaction is it's a silver by 0.02 but then I understand that the illness that I was so unfortunate to get at the time I got it was just very unfortunate but at the same time I am very happy I did come away with a medal because it could have been so much worse."
He added: "A lot to be proud but also a lot to digest."
However, Peaty, who has struggled with injury and his mental health in the last couple of years, gave no indication whether this would be his last Olympics.
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