IOC disqualifies three Romanian weightlifters from London Games

Razvan Martin of Romania competes in the men’s 63kg weightlifting competition at the World Weightlifting Championships in Antalya, on September 21, 2010. AFP PHOTO / MUSTAFA OZER (Photo by MUSTAFA OZER / AFP)

Three Romanian weightlifters, including two medallists, were on Wednesday disqualified from the 2012 London Olympics after fresh analysis showed their urine samples to be tainted with banned substances, the IOC announced.

The weightlifters were named as Razvan Martin, a bronze medallist in the men’s 69kg category, Roxana Cocos, a silver medallist in the women’s 69kg category, and Gabriel Sincraian, who did not finish the men’s 85kg event, the IOC said.

Reanalysis of Martin’s samples resulted in a positive test for the prohibited substances dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, metenolone and stanozolol.

Cocos and Sincraian both tested positive for metenolone and stanozolol.

The International Olympic Committee has been storing samples from the Olympic Games since Athens 2004, and has reanalyzed them systematically.

Nine other weightlifters from the London Games, including six medallists, have already been disqualified.

Weightlifting has more recently been in turmoil since a January documentary by German TV channel ARD revealed what it described as a “culture of corruption” in the sport intended to mask the use of doping.

Hungarian Tamas Ajan, 81, chairman of the IWF for 20 years after serving as its secretary general, rejected the accusations as “lies” before being pressured into resigning in April.

According to the documentary, until 2017 high-level weightlifters were being exempted from many doping controls, and test results were being altered in exchange for bribes.