OTHER SPORTS

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Russia. A case of suspected doping. Announced at an Olympics where the country is already banned for doping. A child involved.

Could it sound any worse?

The revelation that 15-year-old figure skater Kamila Valieva failed a drugs test before Beijing 2022 has put the Games under a black cloud, swinging the spotlight away from sport and once again on a dark subject that simply will not go away.

There are now questions over timelines regarding the matter, a legal case under way, uncertainty over medals won - and that is without even considering the wider damage to the credibility of anti-doping measures and the welfare of a young athlete.

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Eileen Gu amassed an army of cynics when she spurned Team USA to represent China at the Beijing Games.

Moments after the biggest run of her life, the 18-year-old freestyle skiing prodigy was asked about her status as a U.S. citizen, her feelings on Peng Shuai and the incessant hate she’s received on social media.

“If people don’t believe me, if people don’t like me, then that’s their loss,” Gu said. “They’re never going to win the Olympics.”

Gu did just that, earning the first of what she and her many fans in Beijing hope could be three gold medals by cranking out the first 1620 of her career in her final turn, stunning Tess Ledeux of France to win the Olympic debut of women’s freeski big air.

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The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Organizing Committee said on Tuesday that a total of 24 new COVID-19 cases were detected among games-related personnel on Jan. 31.

Eighteen of the cases were found among new airport arrivals, according to a notice on the Beijing 2022 official website.

Six others were among those already in the "closed loop" bubble that separates all event personnel from the public, five of whom were classified as either an athlete or a team official, the notice said.

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About 80% of the U.S. team’s athletes signed up to go to Friday’s opening ceremony at the Beijing Olympics, dimming any notion that they would skip the celebration in a show of protest.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee said 177 of its 223 athletes wanted to go to the ceremony at the Bird's Nest.

Not a single athlete who qualified chose not to come, leaving the political statements to the U.S. government, which will not send dignitaries to the Games in protest of China's human-rights record and other issues.

At a news conference in Beijing, held hours before the opening, CEO Sarah Hirshland said the athletes have been briefed — some of them multiple times — about the laws and customs of China and have been advised to make their own choices when it comes to protesting or demonstrating on Chinese soil.