Aussie Coach On Chinese Doping Scandal: “It’s A Waste of Energy”
By Retta Race on SwimSwam
On the heels of the Chinese Swimming Federation announcing its 31-strong roster for the 2024 Olympic Games, Australian head coach Rohan Taylor spoke to the press about the looming doping scandal surrounding the Asian nation.
As we reported, 11 of the newly-named Paris roster for China were among 23 athletes who tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine (TMZ) at the start of the calendar year in 2021, about seven months before the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
The swimmers were not sanctioned by CHINADA, China’s anti-doping agency, as traces of TMZ were reportedly found present in the hotel the swimmers stayed at. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) upheld CHINADA’s decision.
While the situation may be on athletes’ and coaches’ minds as swimming action gets underway next month in Paris, Taylor told national broadcaster ABC, “I think for us, internally, we can only control what we can control.
“The narrative is quite clear, and that’s all we can do. We have to trust that WADA and World Aquatics are going to continue to investigate, and that we are aligned with a clean sport.
“That’s where we are at the moment, and we’ll continue to monitor that, but as far as it’s distracting us in competition, I think it’s not a controllable thing for us.
“For it to be a distraction, I think it’s probably a waste of energy.”
Taylor continued, “I look at it as, we’re going in and competing.
“If somebody’s not doing the right thing, we hope the system catches them and that’s basically how we work, because our guys get tested all the time too, so we’re in the same boat.”
Key Australian match-ups against the Chinese include Emma McKeon taking on Zhang Yufei in the women’s 100m fly and Zac Stubblety-Cook dueling with Qin Haiyang in the men’s 200m breaststroke.
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