We’re all familiar with the drugging shenanigans of the Russians at the 2022 Olympics, trying as they often do to give their athletes an unfair advantage. But some competitors and coaches suggest their Chinese hosts may be using food to put visiting athletes at a disadvantage…
A typical ‘meal’ served to Russian biathloner Valeria Vasnetsova
while she was in COVID quarentine in Beijing…
It’s nowhere near as high-profile as the Russian doping scandals – especially the one involving the 15-year-old figure skater who fell apart under the pressure of official and public scrutiny. But visiting athletes living in the Chinese Olympic bubble have managed to get word to the outside world of another issue that directly effects their ability to perform at their best.
Polish speed skater Natalia Maliszewska missed her 500 metre short track event last Saturday, while in quarantine. “I don’t believe in anything anymore. In no tests. No games. It’s a big joke for me,” she wrote on Twitter, in Polish. Soon after, she was pronounced fit to return to the Olympic village, after back-to-back negative COVID tests. So the Chinese officials said.
Along with draconian measures to control COVID which have seen athletes thrown into ‘quarentine hotels’, missing their events, competitors have apparently had to put up with really crappy food. This would rank as an inconvenience and an insult with most of us. But to high performance athletes, it can directly effect their performance as well as their overall health.
Food is downright abominable
“My stomach hurts, I’m very pale and I have huge black circles around my eyes. I want all this to end. I cry every day. I’m very tired,” Russian biathlon competitor Valeria Vasnetsova posted on Instagram from a quarantine hotel, complaining of inedible food.
Vasnetsova said she mostly survived on a few pieces of pasta because it was ‘impossible’ to eat the rest, “but today I ate all the fat they serve instead of meat because I was very hungry.” She reported she had lost a lot of weight: “My bones are already sticking out.”
Not just in quarantine
German skiing coach Christian Schweiger told Reuters, “The catering is extremely questionable, because really it’s not catering at all… I would have expected that the Olympic Committee is capable of providing hot meals. […] There are crisps, some nuts and chocolate and nothing else. This shows a lack of focus on high-performance sport.”
If this seems ridiculous to you, take heart in the knowledge that I and many other folks outside the greater Chinese national bubble agree.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) responded to repeated complaints about the food in Beijing in an op-ed last week in The Washington Post: “We are aware of the complaints raised by some athletes, particularly with regard to food temperature, variety and portion size,” the IOC said. “The issues are currently being addressed together with Beijing 2022 and the respective management of the facilities concerned.”
Far from a good enough response
That comes off, in my estimation, as a pretty soft admission of problems which the people on the ground say are much more serious. I guess the IOC doesn’t want to upset the Chinese. They never want to upset anybody, no matter how egregious the crimes and high misdemeanors. Witness the ‘non-punishment’ meted out to the Russians over the 15-year-old figure skater who had not one, not two, but three banned substances in her system. They allowed the Russians to still compete, including the 15-year-old – but said there would simply be no public medal presentations if they won anything. Ridiculous.
I agree with speed skater Maliszewska. The Olympics have become a joke. And not just the 2022 effort. Observers have complained in the past that the IOC is a wishy-washy, ineffectual bunch of political apologists. But now they’re condoning the abuse of competitors. For a start, the Chinese should never be allowed to compete in the Games again – much less host them. Period. Their athletes should be banned from other international sporting events, too, to drive the point home.
Muse on that!
~ Maggie J.