Three of China's dominant weightlifting team from the Beijing Olympics have been caught doping by the International Olympic Committee's programme of re-testing samples from the 2008 and 2012 Games.
Liu Chunhong (69kg category), Cao Lei (75kg) and Chen Xiexia (48kg) have all tested positive for Human Growth Hormone-releasing peptide GHRP-2 and now lose the gold medals they claimed in Beijing.
The three women were part of the Chinese team that won eight of the 15 weightlifting medals on offer, with Chunhong also winning gold at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, a medal she will keep despite this positive test. The trio have also won several world titles.
This will cause deep embarrassment in China, which topped the medal table for the first time in 2008, and increase the calls for weightlifting to be thrown out of the Olympics.
The sport has provided by far the most cases in the IOC's re-analysis of doping samples from Beijing and London, with three more weightlifters also revealed as cheats today from London 2012: Turkey's Sibel Simsek, Intigam Zairov of Azerbaijan and Armenian Norayr Vardanyan.
Of those three, four-time European champion Simsek came closest to the podium, finishing fourth in the women's 63kg category.
Today's batch of positives should also spell the end of Belarusian shot putter Nadzeya Ostapchuk's controversial career as she has now lost the bronze medal she won in Beijing. She has already been stripped of the gold medal she claimed in London and the world title she won in 2005, so this is her third fail.
Ostapchuk's compatriot Darya Pchelnik, who came fourth in Beijing 2008's hammer competition, has also been caught using the steroid turinabol.
As of last month, the IOC's programme of re-testing samples from the 2008 and 2012 Games using the latest detection methods had resulted in 101 new positives.
