Reallocating Olympic Medals

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(Edited)

In sports, medals are given after the event that determined the winners is finished and it is done with a ceremony. So let's say in athletics, after the 100m men is finished, officials bring out the medals, winners get on the podium, get the medal and some flowers (most likely), flags are up, anthems can be heard and that's all.

The problem starts when doping results are in and turns out the winner or someone else from the top three is not eligible as he/she failed the doping test. What happens then?

Obviously the athlete is stripped from the medal and everyone below him moves up a place. This is all nice but how those athletes who get a medal are celebrated? Have you thought about it? Do they get the ceremony they are entitled to? Let's go back in time and see what's happened during the years.

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Athletes stripped of medals
1984-2012 Olympics (athletics only)

Just look at the chart and see who's been cheating. I guess we all knew the answer, there's no surprise here.

Andrew Steele the British runner was shopping when he got a call and was announced that he won a bronze medal. This was in 2016, eight years after the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008. Eight years were needed to find out the Russians were doping and thus they won the bronze medal cheating.

Britain's 4x400m relay squad from the 2008 Beijing Games got their podium moment in front of a home crowd at the London Anniversary Games last month, finally becoming Olympic medallists after a nine-year delay.
They are among dozens of athletes who are receiving medals after their competitors were disqualified retrospectively and stripped of their achievements because of doping offences. source

The article was published in 16 August 2017, which means the ceremony took place nine years after the event.

I was thinking maybe sumo is different as they have a strict ritual and the sport has a strong spiritual side but I was wrong. The Sumo chief resigned over drug scandal, August of Wakanoho, a Russian fighter was arrested for possession, Roho, and Hakurozan, both tested positive, and were banned for life. They were both Russian of course. Given the fact that these were all Russians, I hope genuine Japanese sumo wrestlers don't do doping.



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