Bitter pill as tiny gymnast loses gold

The full weight of the Olympic movement came crashing down on the slender shoulders of Andreea Raducan, all because of two Nurofen tablets, but the Romanian gymnast refused to buckle.

She confidently strolled into the main Olympic press centre in Sydney to face the world's media yesterday, nestled between the towering figure of Ion Tiriac, head of the Romanian Olympic Committee but intent on resigning over her case, and the majestic presence of Nadia Comaneci, her country's most famous athlete.

At only 148cm (4ft 10in) tall, the 16-year-old could barely see over the microphone as she spoke about the decision to strip her of the gold medal in the women's all-round individual gymnastics.

She had not slept for four days and had spent several hours being grilled by International Olympic Committee officials until the early morning, but as far as a defiant Raducan was concerned a grave injustice had been done.

"I have lost my medal but I know in my soul that it is mine," she said through an interpreter. "My heart is at peace; I did everything right.

"What I took was just a normal pill. It did not help me compete. On the contrary, it gave a little dizzy feeling. I just took something for a cold; I have done nothing wrong."

Raducan had been told about an hour earlier that the Court of Arbitration for Sport had upheld an IOC ruling to take away her medal because she tested positive for the banned drug pseudoephedrine last Thursday.

The court's decision was a surprise, given that her plight had generated a lot of sympathy among IOC officials and because the general view was that she was the victim of a mistake by the Romanian team doctor Ioachim Oana, who prescribed the drug. He has been sent home and banned from future international events.

Raducan was joined on stage by her fellow Romanians Simona Amanar, who originally won silver in the women's individual event, and Maria Olaru, who won bronze. They will now be awarded gold and silver respectively. Initially they said they would not accept the medals but yesterday they said that they would take them because "they belong to Romania".

"I am not going to quit," said Raducan. "I want to prove to everybody that I can go one better and that I am the person that I really am. I am not a cheat. I have nothing to be ashamed of."

At an emotional press conference Tiriac, a former professional tennis player who once coached Boris Becker, revealed that six lawyers and an independent pharmacologist gave statements supporting Raducan.

She was given two Nurofen, about an hour before she was due to compete, after developing slight breathing problems because of a cold she had caught since her arrival in Australia. Amanar took the same drug but because she is 7kg (15lb) heavier than Raducan, who weighs only 37kg, it did not show up in the test.

Despite the sympathy her case has generated, Matthieu Reeb, the acting general secretary of the CAS, said: "A strict liability test must be applied, the consequence being automatic disqualification as a matter of law and in fairness to all other athletes.

"This is why factors such as the athlete's age, her weight, the need for medication... the fact that the drug may not have enhanced performance, and the reliance on the team's doctor are irrelevant.

"The panel [of judges] is aware of the impact of its decision on a fine young elite athlete... The anti-doping code must be enforced."

Romanian officials see Raducan as a victim of the war against drugs in the sporting world, of political pressure to weed out the cheats. For Tiriac, who is close to Juan Antonio Samaranch and heavily involved in the IOC's drugs campaign, it is an unfair price to pay. Yesterday he announced that he would resign as an Olympic official - he is also on the IOC's finance commission - because he did not want to judge Raducan's case when she comes before the Romanian Olympic Committee.

Ironically, Tiriac was responsible for introducing a rule that any Romanian athlete tested positive for drugs would be banned for life. "I was the first to say that any athlete who tested positive in my squad would be suspended for life," he said. "But these girls did not do anything wrong.

"I am going to resign before I have to judge this case because I cannot look an athlete like Andreea in the eye and ban her for life.

"The IOC is between a rock and a hard place. They are under political pressure [on doping] but they do not have the courage to say that in this case they have made a mistake. There must be leniency... innocent people should not be punished."

Tiriac argued that if an athlete from a bigger, more influential country had tested positive for pseudoephedrine, IOC officials might not have been so stringent, and that the lack of finance may have also worked against Raducan: "The budget of the Romanian team is 100,000 times smaller than for the Americans. We cannot prepare our doctors in the same way. Our team doctor works in a small hospital and gives his time for free."

Raducan will keep her gold medal for the team event and the silver she won in the vault as she did not test positive after those disciplines.

As she reflects on the unfortunate circumstances that have robbed her of glory and returns home with two instead of three medals, she can also add another title to her name: the unluckiest athlete of the Sydney games.