Thomas Bach was not in the stands of the Beijing Omnisports Palace to attend the free program of the individual figure skating event on Thursday evening, but he still said he was "very disturbed" by Kamila Valieva's performance. followed on television.

"Seeing her crack on the ice, crying and trying to finish her program was difficult. In every movement, in her body language, we saw the immense stress", declared Thomas Bach during his traditional press conference at the end of the Olympics.

Russian skater Kamila Valieva, in tears at the end of her free program, on February 17, 2022 at the Beijing Olympics Anne-Christine POUJOULAT AFP

The boss of the body, himself an Olympic fencing champion, refers to the two falls, clumsiness and other errors of the Russian prodigy who ended up cracking during the most important free program of his career after spending more of a week at the heart of a storm born of a positive doping control.

Favorite for the title and in the lead after the short program, Valieva ended up with only 141.93 points and a total score of 224.09 points, synonymous with fourth place, far from her compatriot and training partner Anna Shcherbakova, crowned Olympic champion at 17.

Russian Kamila Valieva during her free figure skating program on February 17 at the Beijing Olympics Anne-Christine POUJOULAT AFP

WADA investigation

But more than the skater's mental implosion, what stunned the IOC boss was what happened on her way off the ice when she was greeted with reproaches from Eteri Tutberidze: " Why did you give up? Why did you stop fighting? Explain to me... You gave up...", asserted the coach at the head of a real factory of Moscow champions.

For the IOC boss, this scene was "icy, instead of trying to help and comfort her": "We felt the distance and interpreting her body language (from her coach, editor's note) it was dismissive. I wondered how one could really be so cold”, lamented Thomas Bach.

Russian skater Kamila Valieva after her free program at the Beijing Olympics, February 17, 2022 Manan VATSYAYANA AFP

"It doesn't inspire much confidence in my surroundings, regardless of what may have happened, or will happen in the future, how (is it possible to) treat a 15-year-old underage athlete like that?" , he concluded.

This is not the first time that Valieva's entourage has been singled out: the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) announced that it was investigating "support staff", without further details, after the champion Europe 2022 was tested positive at the end of December for trimetazidine, used to treat angina pectoris and banned by WADA since 2014, because it promotes blood circulation.

Russian Sports Minister Oleg Matytsin regretted Thomas Bach's comments, saying he should have shown "more reserve": "Judging the behavior of a coach and his relationship with an athlete on TV is for the less debatable.

"Rarely Alone"

The Valieva affair broke out in the middle of the 2022 Olympics, when her positive control was notified to the skater just after her victory in the team event with Russia.

24 hours before the start of the individual event, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, urgently seized by the IOC and WADA, validated the decision of Russian anti-doping to lift Valieva's suspension on the pretext that depriving her of the Olympics -2022 would cause him "irreparable" harm.

“The question of the entourage is extremely important, because (Valieva) is a minor and we need to be told how she can have products in her body which obviously should not be there”, recalled Mr. Bach. .

"According to my experience of the doping cases that I have had to manage, when there is doping, it is very rarely done alone," he insisted.

This case also raises the question of the age of competitors, who are often minors in figure skating: should a minimum age be set?

"We are going to start discussions on this question, we must think about it calmly with WADA on one side and the international federations to find out if there is a need for regulation".

Russian Kamila Valieva, during her short program of the team event at the Beijing Olympics, February 6, 2022 WANG Zhao AFP / Archives

The International Skating Federation told AFP that it would propose to raise the minimum age to compete in seniors, currently 15 years old to raise it to 17, at its next congress scheduled for June 6 to 10.

But for the moment, the most pressing question in the eyes of Thomas Bach concerns Kamila Valieva and her entourage: "All the light will be shed and we will not hesitate to take all the necessary measures, even the strongest", a- he warned.

© 2022 AFP