Reports allege Russia orchestrated successful doping scam at Sochi

With just weeks left before the Rio Olympics begin, reports are beginning to surface that allege the most recent prior Games were tainted by doping scandals.

A New York Times report indicates that dozens of Russian Olympians at Sochi participated in a far-reaching, state-operated doping program, according to the then-director of Russia's anti-doping laboratory. Grigory Rodchenkov contends that he created a concoction of three drugs and liquor that he provided to at least 15 medal winners.

The testing agency and Russian intelligence services combined to swap out the athletes' tainted urine with clean urine taken months earlier. Rodchenkov estimated that as many as 100 samples were exchanged under the cover of darkness, and that none of the doping athletes were caught.

“We were fully equipped, knowledgeable, experienced and perfectly prepared for Sochi like never before,” Rodchenkov said. “It was working like a Swiss watch.”

The Times story breaks down the sequence of events Rodchenkov says was in place to help route performance-enhancing drugs to athletes and to help them avoid detection. The drugs were dissolved in liquor and the athletes were encouraged to swish them around in their mouths to improve absorption into the bloodstream. And since the athletes were taking the drugs during the Games, other agents were at work breaking into the supposedly tamper-proof bottles to swap out tainted urine for clean.

Rodchenkov contended that the Russian sports ministry provided the anti-doping lab with a list of athletes whose urine needed to be swapped out, and a third of the athletes on that list won medals. In all, Russia won 33 medals at Sochi, including 13 golds.

However, Rodchenkov was named in a World Anti-Doping Agency report last year that indicted the entire Russian drug testing program. Rodchenkov fled Russia and re-settled in Los Angeles; the New York Times reported that two of his former colleagues died unexpectedly within weeks of each other in February.

Russia faced tremendous pressure to come through on the medal stage in Sochi. The nation had spent billions to host the Games, and president Vladimir Putin staked much of his international reputation on the Games' success. The nation will also host the World Cup in 2018. But in the wake of the WADA report, the nation's track and field team was suspended provisionally, and its status for Rio remains yet to be determined.

The International Olympic Committee retains its own set of samples, separate from those tested by the Russian lab, and has indicated that it will re-test samples if necessary. The IOC holds all samples for 10 years in order to use the most up-to-date testing protocols.

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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports and the author of EARNHARDT NATION. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter or on Facebook.