Chinese Swimmers All Clean in 2002, Official

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, April 14, 2003

Chinese Swimmers All Clean in 2002, Official

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Chinese swimmers enjoyed a clean year in 2002, with no positive result from 745 tests conducted on them by both the Chinese swimming association (CSA) and world swimming body FINA, a Chinese official announced Monday in Tianjin.

"We have shaken off the shadow of drugs in 2002," said CSA chairman Li Hua in the annual anti-doping conference before the Spring National Championships.

"It shows that Chinese swimmers can make a big splash without using the performance-enhancing drugs," he added.

Among the 745 tests, 639 were conducted by the CSA and Chinese Anti-Doping Association (CADA), including 350 out-of-competition and 221 in-the-competition urine tests and 68 blood tests. Eighty-four swimmers each had taken more than four tests and 23 star swimmers each had more than seven a year.

FINA and World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) had conducted 84 out-of-competition tests on 54 swimmers and 22 tests on 13 athletes when they competed in international events.

A total of 24 national team members had 85 tests from CSA, CADA,FINA and WADA, including 49 urine and 36 blood tests one week before the 2002 World Short Course Swimming Championships held in Moscow.

Qi Hui, world record holder in the women's 200 meters breaststroke, and Chen Hua, China's top women long-distance freestyler, were each given up to three blood and three urine tests during seven days of pre-championships tests.

China claimed three gold, four silver and five bronze medals plus a world record in women's 4x200m freestyle relay in Moscow.

Later in the Busan Asian Games in September, China beat their long-time rivals Japan 20-11 on the gold tally, bringing down six Asian records.

"We are proud of our swimmers who got through the intense and frequent tests and had great performance in international events,"said the Chinese swimming chief Li Hua. "We will continue to crackdown on banned drugs."

Since anti-doping tests were started in 1990, the CSA has punished 48 swimmers and relevant persons for various doping offenses.

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