Several medals will change from 2003 SEA Games

January 28, 2004

As many as eight athletes will have South East Asian Games medals taken away from them after failing drug tests, completely scrambling the 2003 SEA medals table.

Organizers had originally announced the day after the games closed that there had been no positives of 400 samples tested. The latest report mentions that around 800 samples were tested and contained some positives.

Four of the athletes are from Vietnam, and one from Myanmar, the other three athletes have so far not been named.

If the organizing committee does decide to re-distribute the medals, here's some of what will happen.

The medals table in fin swimming will change. Vietnamese fin swimmer Pham Toan Thang won three gold medals in the pool. Those medals, in the 50m surface, 100m surface and 50 m underwater, will all go to another Vietnamese swimmer, Phan Luu Cam Than, who finished second in all three races.

In the 50 meter event, bronze medalist Adrian Sansoldi Lamano, from Indonesia will move up to the silver medal position, fourth place finisher Lim Yaoxiang, of Singapore, will get the bronze.

Lamano will also move up to the silver position in the 100m event, with Teerapong Phuagkhaophong gaining the bronze. 

Another Vietnamese medalists name was reported as Nguyen Thi Diu, but there does not seem to be any results in finswimming for that athlete. A Pham Thi Diu and a Nguyen Thi Hang are listed but no Nguyen Thi Diu in the results.

Hoang Hong Anh, won two golds in canoeing. If those medals are vacated and redistributed, in the 500m C1 race Myanmars Aung Lin will win the gold, and an athlete listed in the results as Agus, from Indonesia will win the silver. Thailand's Yutthakan Lkaowanna did not finish the race, and presumably would not earn a medal.

Aung Lin would also win the gold medal in the 1000m C1 race, Atib Roni of Indonesia would move up to silver, and Camelito Dacasin of the Phillipines move up to bronze.

Nguyen Mai Quynh, would give up Vietnam's silver medal in the Women's triple jump. Malaysia's Ngew Sin Mei would take the silver, Vietnam's Bui Thi Nhat Thanh the bronze and Thailand's Wacharee Rittiwat retain the gold.

Judo silver medalist Aye Aye Thine of Myanmar would lose her medal in the 52 kg class of judo. Judges will have to decide if the medal is simply vacated, or if the two bronze medallists (semifinal losers are both awarded a bronze medal) will both be awarded silver, or both keep their bronze medals.

No news on when or if games organizers will be issuing a complete revision and clarification of the results and medals table as published at the games web site at http://english.seagames22.com.vn/

The athletes have blamed aspirin and analgesics for the positive tests. The laboratory named the drugs found in the samples as stanozol and testosterone.

Prior to the games, two bodybuilders from Singapore failed drug tests and were not allowed to participate in the games. Edwin Tan had tested positive for 19-norandrosterone. The ban was his second. He had only recently returned from a two-year ban in July. Nor Perwiira Jaya Rahmat tested positive for furosemide.