Oleksandr Dryhol self-portrait on Instagram.
Remember the
50-year-old hammer thrower with the too-good-to-be-true 77.70 mark — an apparent world age-group record? He tops a list of suspected drug cheats.
See this report. Soviet-born
Oleksandr Dryhol, now of Israel, is being called out for his precipitous drop in 2012 – from 79.42 meters to 69.57 at the London Games. “At the Olympics, Dryhol [placed] nearly dead last. Then the next year he tested positive for steroids. This year he is back from his suspension and competing now for Israel. At the age of 50 he hit a season’s best of 77.70 meters at the same venue as his big 2012 throw. To put the mark in perspective, it is not only 6 meters beyond
Jud Logan’s world record for the 50-year-old age group, but also with a heavier hammer as Logan’s mark was with the 6-kilogram hammer. Not surprisingly, he lost nearly 10 meters at a major championship, managing just 68.10 meters at this month’s European Championships.”
The report continued:
It appears as though Israel has left him off their Olympic team, and rumors are also floating around that he is among the 45 new positives from retests of doping samples from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics. But if he does make it to Rio, I would definitely bet against him breaking 70 meters there.
Almost as amazing as the 77.70 is the fact Oleksandr noted my blog post on his Instagram feed. I’ve requested an interview.
5 Responses
I would love to believe that a 50 yo hammer thrower could accomplish this, but then I would have to believe in the Easter Bunny also. That 77.70m mark age grades out (if you use the 49 yo conversion factor so the hammer weight is taken out of the equation) to a throw of 99 meters. Impossible. However, if you take masters marks from Jud Logan and Ed Burke, they age grade out pretty well to their best open marks. So I have some assurance that the age grade table is not completely wacked.
I think 2 things are going on here; (1) fraudulent meet results; and (2) if he were to pee in a cup, the plastic container would melt.
I have written to Oleksandr and hope he responds to my queries. Stay tuned.
I would love to think that he is clean but if it turns out that he is taking something, i am sure that he will say that it was only for his health as so many masters athletes have claimed when they got caught.
Will be watching the qualifying results- should be interesting.
August 17th
Men’s Hammer Throw: Qualifying (6 PM)
Yes, it will be interesting, but Drygol wasn’t selected.
There will be plenty of failure to go around. If it goes like 2012, only the top four reached the Olympic standard in London.
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