Vancouver 2010 gold medal given out 16 years later after champion caught cheating
If at first you didn’t succeed at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics… maybe you just had to wait 16 years.
At least, that was pretty much the case for a few athletes taking part in biathlon in the last Olympics to be held in Canada.
On Sunday in Rasen-Antholz, Italy, 14 athletes took place in a medal reallocation ceremony, a fancy way of saying that a pair of athletes got caught cheating and had their medals stripped.
In this case, it was Russian athlete Evgeny Ustyugov who was stripped of the Vancouver 2010 gold medal in the 15km mass start biathlon and the bronze medal in the relay. He was also stripped of a gold medal at the 2014 Sochi Games in his home country, with athletes from that event receiving medals on Sunday as well.
14 Olympians from Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014 received reallocated Olympic medals during an emotional ceremony at #MilanoCortina2026 today, in front of 20,000+ fans gathered at the Antholz-Anterselva Biathlon Arena.
More: https://t.co/4jJ82w3EjL pic.twitter.com/Qo7GiNosN2
— IOC MEDIA (@iocmedia) February 15, 2026
The mass start athletes were the ones on hand in Italy for Sunday’s ceremony.
“Some moments are lived with the intensity of the present, others need time to reveal their full meaning. Proud of this message sent for a cleaner sport. It’s never too late to do right,” new gold medallist Martin Fourcade out of France wrote on Instagram.
Pavol Hurajt of Slovakia was uprgraded to silver, while Christoph Sumann was uprgraded to bronze in the mass star.
Ustyugov was first found to have had a doping violation in 2020, though it took more than five years before the decision was made in September 2025 to formally reallocate his medals. In all events where he particpated, (or any other athlete found guilty of a doping violation), each competitor is moved up a slot — silver to gold, bronze to silver, fourth to bronze, etc.
“This is a really special moment for these athletes,” said IOC President Kirsty Coventry. “To be able to celebrate them here, in front of thousands of fans and alongside their families, is what the Olympic Games are all about. These athletes earned this recognition, and it’s wonderful to see them receive it on an Olympic stage.”