A Russian may lose his bronze medal after failing a doping test in a sport not accustomed to such high-profile cases, but one that is physically demanding.
GANGNEUNG, South Korea — Victoria Moiseeva, in a high-stakes match, found it impossible to push a brewing scandal out of her mind on Monday morning at Gangneung Curling Centre. It was the first time in her life, she said, that she could not fully focus while competing.
“It’s a catastrophe,” she said.
Moiseeva, the skip, or head curler, of the Russian women’s team was referring to the possible effects of a failed doping test by a fellow Russian curler here at the 2018 Winter Olympics.
She and some other Russian athletes fretted that the damage from this single case could be widespread.
“This is simply terrifying to think about,” she said.
The athlete, Alexander Krushelnytsky, is the first from Russia to come under investigation at these Games for using a banned substance, jeopardizing the bronze medal he won last week in the mixed doubles competition with his wife. It also complicates Russia’s effort to rehabilitate its image after a vast state-backed cheating scheme at the 2014 Sochi Games it hosted left it nominally barred as a team from the Games.
The International Olympic Committee had been considering allowing Russia to march under its own flag at the closing ceremony Sunday. But several members now privately suggested that allowing that would risk appearing to appease Russia and could undercut an effort to play up the peacemaking presence of a North Korea delegation at the Games.
Krushelnytsky stands out because he does not ski, skate or soar off banks of halfpipes seven stories high — athletic pursuits here that are among the most physically demanding. No, he curls, sweeping a broom to guide a granite rock across a sheet of ice.
On rare occasions, there have been doping violations in curling, since it is, on balance, a taxing feat of endurance to sweep the broom round after round. The sport, however, is not accustomed to being at the center of such a high-profile case, so the news sowed confusion and puzzlement among some of the curlers here.
“I was a bit shocked this morning,” said Madeleine Dupont, the skip of the Danish women’s team. “I was like, ‘That cannot be true.’ But then again, people have been taking all sorts of stuff: natural medicine or lip balm or I don’t know what. So I wouldn’t really judge anyone until I knew it was on purpose.”
Asked if she thought the sport’s reputation could be harmed, Dupont said: “I think most people will laugh and be like, ‘What would you possibly need doping for?’”
Krushelnytsky, in a routine urine check, was found to have traces of meldonium in his system. Use of the drug, a heart medicine that increases blood flow and has been banned from most sports since 2016, has ensnared other Russian athletes in doping cases in the past couple years.
Neither Krushelnytsky, who has left the athletes’ village for Seoul, the South Korean capital, to await the results of the final test, nor his wife, Anastasia Bryzgalova, are competing in the team events.
Sergei Belanov, the coach of the Russian women’s team, voiced public support for Krushelnytsky.
“I don’t believe that a young man, a clever man, will use the same doping that was so big the last two years,” Belanov said. “It’s stupid. But Alexander is not stupid. So sorry, I don’t believe it.”
The drug is thought to enhance endurance and would possibly play a role in curling by increasing the stamina of athletes, who must be accurate with their shots, sometimes down to the centimeter. Hard sweeping can take a toll over the course of a long match. As a result, more curlers than ever, especially at the Olympic level, are training with weights and focusing on fitness to improve their endurance and precision.
“It’s like any sport: You need strength,” Nina Roth said after leading the United States women’s team to a narrow win against Denmark. “But you have to do it on your own merit.”
Brent Laing, who plays for the Canadian men’s team, said he had no idea how meldonium would enhance performance.
“Outside of beer and Advil, that’s the only painkillers I’ve ever heard of for curling,” Laird said. “I imagine it wasn’t that. Hopefully not, or else I’d be in trouble.”
Russia was barred from the Olympics in December after an investigation into a state-backed doping program. The International Olympic Committee, however, later cleared more than 160 Russian athletes to compete here in Pyeongchang as Olympic Athletes From Russia under the Olympic banner.
Moiseeva, whose team lost to Switzerland on Monday morning, said she thought about reaching out to Krushelnytsky and Bryzgalova but decided against it. She would not have known what to say to them, she said.
“It’s impossible to believe,” Moiseeva said in Russian, adding: “We delighted in the results and in the success of the pair. It’s impossible to believe that someone could do such a thing and sleep calmly at night and ruin not just the life of one person but those of a large number of people.”
She went on, “We always said it was so great to be involved in a sport where you wouldn’t have such scandals because this is simply not necessary. You don’t need to be faster, higher and stronger. You need to be more accurate, not necessarily stronger. I can’t even understand what medication would be necessary and what you could use it for in curling. For that reason, it’s very hard to believe.”
That this was playing out at the curling venue contrasted with a sport known for exacting standards when it comes to courteous behavior and a sense of fair play. Curling also has a long tradition of opponents meeting for beers after a good, clean bonspiel (curling lingo for tournament).
But even before the doping case, curling had experienced its share of controversy here at the Olympics.
Last week, Rachel Homan, the skip of the Canadian women’s team, broke with etiquette by having a curling stone removed from competition when an opponent from Denmark accidentally touched it with her broom. After Denmark came back to win, Dupont, the team’s skip, told a reporter from CBC Sports that it was “karma.” Even some Canadian fans were bothered by Homan’s decision.
Then, on Sunday, an equipment malfunction appeared to cost the women’s team from Britain in a loss to Sweden.
