Olympic Games was like a cold war, says Russian swimmer Yulia Efimova
The 24-year-old won two silver medals in Rio de Janeiro having initially been excluded because of her doping record and was jeered by the crowd and her main rivals
Russian Yulia Efimova, who won two Olympic Games silver medals this month after being cleared to compete following a doping ban, has compared swimming in Rio de Janeiro to being at war.
Initially excluded from the event because of her doping record, the 24-year-old won a last-minute legal challenge to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and finished second in the 100 and 200 metres breaststroke in Brazil.
“I felt under pressure from the sportsmen, the fans, the press. This was awful and it was not like being at an Olympics, which usually unites people. This was not a competition, but a war – a cold war,” Efimova said.
The four-times world champion announced in March that a doping test had shown she had taken the banned drug meldonium, and she was subsequently banned from all competitions.
