FOUR MEMBERS OF Brazil’s national swimming team, including Olympic gold medallist Cesar Cielo, have received a controversial pardon from their national federation after testing positive for the banned diuretic Furosemide.

Apparently content to accept the quartet’s excuse that a contaminated food supplement was to blame for the result (also known as “The Contador”), the CBDA decided to issue a warning in lieu of the standard ban from competition.

Swimming’s governing body, FINA, has taken a less conciliatory approach to the controversy, however, and decided to appeal the judgement to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS):

“The athletes are presently not suspended and the appeal will, in principle, have no effect of suspending their right to participate to events pending a decision. The CAS Panel is the only authority which could make a decision on provisional suspension.

“FINA will use its best efforts to obtain a decision within the shortest possible time. FINA will in particular propose to apply expedited proceedings, it being observed that this depends on the agreements of the parties.”

One of Cielo’s rivals, Frenchman Alain Bernard, has already branded the stand-off “bad for world swimming”, underlining the extent to which the controversy threatens to cast a pall over this month’s World Swimming Championships and further damage a sport already struggling to move beyond its embarrassing dalliance with polyurethane bodysuits.

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