The Canadian weight lifter Christine Girard had won bronze in London. But the two who had beaten her tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in 2016, giving Girard the gold.
When Christine Girard was presented with the gold medal in weight lifting from the 2012 Olympics, there was a podium, a Canadian flag and an anthem sung by a choir. In the audience were Olympians, officials, friends and family.
Included among them were her three children, none of them yet born in 2012. That’s because the presentation of the medal came on Monday, more than six years after the competition.
In London, Girard lifted a total of 520 pounds, good for third place in her division. It was the first medal ever for a female Canadian weight lifter. But in 2016, Maiya Maneza of Kazakhstan and Svetlana Tsarukayeva of Russia were disqualified after retesting of their samples revealed performance-enhancing drugs. Girard became the retroactive gold medalist.
