The Olympics have a double standard when it comes to doping...That's what Sha'Carri Richardson is claiming after the most recent scandal to break from the 2022 Winter Olympics.
It was revealed that Russian figure skater, Kamila Valieva, tested positive for trimetazidine, a performance enhancing drug. Despite that, she was still allowed to compete.
In contrast, Richardson, who was set to compete at the 2021 Summer Olympics, was banned from the competition entirely that year for smoking marijuana. She secured her spot on the team after she won the 100-meter final at the U.S Trials, just a week after her mother died, only to be suspended.
Now, Richardson is calling out the bias against athletes of color in the Olympics. She tweeted Monday in response to the news of Valieva moving forward in the competition,
"Can we get a solid answer on the difference of her situation and mine? My mother died and I can’t run and was also favored to place top 3. The only difference I see is I’m a black young lady."
Valieva was tested in late December, but the results were not verified until February, three days after the Olympics had started. Valieva had already competed in the team figure skating competition, helping the Russian Olympic Committee win Gold. Richardson has always said that she used weed to cope with her mother's death in a high pressure environment.
She continued,
“Failed in December and the world just now know however my result was posted within a week and my name & talent was slaughtered to the people."
It's also worth noting that Valieva competes with the "Russian Olympic Committee" instead of representing her country traditionally because Russia was banned from competing in the Olympics entirely after too many doping scandals broke.
Now, yet another one of their athletes has used performance enhancers and is allowed to compete, whereas Richardson smoked marijuana once and was kicked off her team, despite THC not affecting performance.
She said in one last tweet,
“Not one BLACK athlete has been about to compete with a case going on, I don’t care what they say!!!"
