A Greek sprinter who failed a doping test days before he was due to compete at the Beijing Olympics is the first athlete to test positive since the IOC took over drugs controls for the Games. Sprinter Tassos Gousis failed a Greek doping agency test and was ordered to return home from his training camp in Japan. The International Olympic Committee confirmed the positive test was done since it officially took over drugs testing for the Aug. 8-24 Games on July 27. But it said it had not conducted the test itself and so the case was one for the Greek authorities to deal with. “Yes, there has been a case of a doping violation found by the Greek doping agency,” IOC spokesperson Giselle Davies told reporters on Saturday. “It was within the Olympic period.” “But it was not an IOC test. This is a case which is under the auspices of the Greek authorities. The athlete will not be coming to Beijing,” she said. The 29-year-old was due to compete in the 200 meters. He now risks being banned from the London 2012 Olympics as well under a new IOC rule that states all athletes with a suspension of more than six months are to be banned from the next Olympics as well. A first-time doping offense usually carries a two-year suspension. The IOC, which will run a total of about 4,500 tests in Beijing and in training camps around the world, has also urged international federations to boost tests ahead of the Games. Many Greek athletes, including 11 weightlifters, a boxer and a swimmer, have tested positive for banned substances in the past months following tougher controls imposed by the Hellenic Olympic Committee (HOC) and the federations ahead of the Games. The HOC had said it would increase the number of tests to avoid the embarrassment created by sprinters Katerina Thanou and Costas Kenteris when they missed a scheduled drugs test on the eve of the 2004 Athens Olympics. Russian pulled Russian steeplechase runner Roman Usov has been pulled out of the Beijing Olympics amid reports he failed a drug test conducted at the selection trials last month and only nine days after seven female athletes were implicated in a doping scandal. “The Russian track and field federation has made the decision that this athlete will not start in Beijing,” team spokesman Gennady Shvets told The Associated Press on Saturday, a day after the opening ceremony.
