Weightlifting: Athlete Maria Luana Grigoriu tests positive for stanozolol

Weightlifter Maria Luana Grigoriu, who is part of the national team, tested positive for metabolites stanozolol (steroid), sources close to the athlete have told AGERPRES.

It is the second time that this athlete from Rapid Bucharest sports club tests positive. The result of her second test was communicated on June 5 by the Doping Control Laboratory Bucharest, after she was first tested on January 15, outside competition, upon her own request.

Grirogiu, who competes in the 64 kg category is one of the most promising weightlifters in Romania with two medals won until now, one silver and one bronze, in the European Junior & U23 Weightlifting Championships, which took place in October 2019 in Bucharest.

This is only one of the doping cases from a series recorded among the Romanian weightlifters in the last period.

According to the decision taken by IWF in 2017, in Tbilisi, any country with three or more positive cases in the CIO re-testings after the testings done for the relevant events of the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games risk to get a one-year suspension.

If Romania exceeds 20 cases of doping, counting from 2008, the number of spots for the 2020 Olympic Games in weightlifting will be cut by 2, from a possible maximum of eight. Romania could avoid the reduction of the number of sports in case that the counter-expertises will result negative or the analysis will not be concluded until the Olympic Games in Tokyo.