Doping is the main scum of world sport. In hopes of medals, athletes sometimes cheat. Moreover, it is not only foreigners who strive for medals who do this. The stars have been caught doping multiple times. RIA Novosti Sport explains how the best of the best stumbled and ruined their careers.

Multiple winners of the most prestigious Tour de France cycling race looked superhuman. When he managed to return to sports after his cancer illness, one could suffocate with delight and admiration. But in May 2011, Lance’s former partner on the USA team reported that the titled athlete was using illegal drugs. Two years later, in an interview on a popular program, he admitted to doping.

Armstrong has been stripped of his titles since August 1998 (he has won seven Tour de France). Sponsorship contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars were terminated with him, and legal costs eroded all the savings in the family budget. Most importantly, Lance lost his respect. It has become the standard for hypocrisy and lies in sports, and getting rid of such a label is harder than making money.

Armstrong managed to get out of the financial vacuum thanks to successful investments. Even before the scandals, he invested $100,000 in the then-small company Uber. Lance married yoga teacher Anna Hansen in 2022 and entered the media space in January. The authors of Procyclingstats.com asked readers if the titles would be returned to Armstrong after 10 years. The American wrote that the question should be asked “to those who have fought it all this time.” The continuation of the story cannot be ignored.

At the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, the American won five medals, becoming the best in the 100m, 200m and triple jump. However, on her first day as Olympic champion, her husband CJ Hunter, a shot putter, was caught doping. Despite passing four positive tests for Nandrolone, he cried about his innocence. Jones has long denied the allegations against him. In 2007, the girl nevertheless admitted to using doping before the Games in Australia.

The IOC reclaimed the medals Jones won, and due to court costs and loss of sponsors, the former champion was quickly out of money. He was also sentenced to six months in prison. “This time it’s the worst nightmare that’s real,” he said. Marion played in the WNBA women’s basketball league for a time after her release and now works as a fitness trainer and motivational coach.

The Canadian set a world record ahead of Carl Lewis in the 100 meters during the 1988 Olympics. However, he was not the hero of the Games for long. Stanozolol was found in the runner’s doping test three days after the race.

Canada’s frustration knew no bounds. There was even a poster in the Olympic village that read “hero to zero”. The press wrote about the runner more often than Wayne Gretzky, mistaken him for scum. As a result of the trials, it was revealed that Johnson used illegal drugs long before the Olympics. His victory at the 1987 World Championships also cannot be called fair. It stopped attracting sponsors. The house my mother bought had to be sold like the BEN983 Ferrari (which had set the hundred-meter record in 1987).

Johnson failed to return to the sport successfully. Results are down. When he was caught doping again, Canadian Sports Minister Pierre Kodo described Ben as a disgrace to the country and advised him to return to Jamaica. In the future, Johnson clung to everything to win. He trained Diego Maradona, participated in horse races, opened a clothing store and even trained Muammar Gaddafi’s son.

Now she advises young athletes and helps them work on their endurance and speed. One of Johnson’s most successful trainees was Canadian hockey player PK Subban. He became Olympic champion in 2014.

At the age of 16, the athlete enchanted the judges of the gymnastics tournament in Sydney, winning gold in team and individual competitions, and silver in the vault. He brought the first all-around gold to Romania since Nadia Comaneci! A few days after the victory, he was in great disappointment.

Pseudoephedrine was found in a doping test – the substance entered the body of a girl with a headache pill, which she took before the competition. The IOC stripped him of his individual gold medal while retaining his other medals. Răducan’s attempts to reclaim the title were unsuccessful. He ended his career at the age of 22 and bought a house and a car with the money he earned.

The Raducan couple, who married a broker in 2016, have two children. She chaired the Romanian Gymnastics Federation from 2017 to 2019 and now takes care of her family and helps the country’s Olympic Committee.

The German skier returned without much success in three Olympics and acquired Spanish citizenship after losing his place in the national team in 1998. In 1999 Johan won the World Cup overall standings for the first time and won the 50km race at the pre-Olympic World Championships, bringing Spain’s first ever gold.

When Mülegg won two Olympic gold medals for the new country in Salt Lake City, the King of Spain congratulated him. You can only guess what awaits him after he returns from the Olympics. However, after the victorious 50 km race, the athlete’s doping test showed couppoetin.

He lost his medals and with them his respect in Spain. Johan could no longer find a common language with the federation. Although he tried to participate in the 2006 Games, he could not return to his former level.

Wandering around, Mülegg went to rebuild a life in Brazil, where no one cared about his shame. There he founded a construction company and went into the real estate business. Johan still refuses to talk to reporters and surfing has become his new hobby.

The Hungarian athlete, who won silver medals at the 2002 European Championships and 2003 World Championships, threw the 70.94 meters discus at the Athens Olympics. After the final, Fazekas was unable to pass the required amount of urine for analysis, and subsequently refused the IOC observers’ offer to perform the necessary procedure at a clinic in the Olympic village.

Despite all the positive qualities that the defense gave in court, Robert was stripped of his medal. According to the observers, they noticed how he tried to change the test tube while the analysis was already ready.

After a two-year disqualification, Fazekas performed unsuccessfully at the Games in China and tested positive for stanozolol a few days before the 2012 Olympics in London. This time he expected an eight-year disqualification.

In 2021, the athlete needed a heart transplant. Due to a genetic predisposition, he began to get very sick, doctors had to resort to organ transplantation. Now he plans to work with Hungarian shooters as a coach.