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"American legendary swimmer Phelps said it would be wrong to 'accuse' Pan Zhanle," according to Hong Kong's South China Morning Post on the 6th. Phelps said in an interview in Paris on the 5th that accusing Pan Zhanle was tantamount to questioning the 23 Olympic gold medals and world records he won in his career.

Former American swimming star Phelps

Last week, Pan Zhanle won the men's 100m freestyle at the Paris Olympics and set a new world record of 46.40 seconds. The South China Morning Post mentioned that Phelps was one of those who questioned this result. He once said on a NBC program that Pan Zhanle's performance was "unheard of" and "incomprehensible". However, Pan Zhanle once again showed his extraordinary strength in the men's 4x100m medley relay final on the 5th, swimming a score of 45.92 seconds in the last leg, helping the team reverse and win the championship.

It is reported that in an interview on the 5th, Phelps talked about Pan Zhanle's results and said: "It's like when my result was 4 minutes and 3 seconds (he set the 400m individual medley world record at the 2008 Beijing Olympics with 4 minutes and 3.84 seconds - Editor's note), and you said I cheated, the situation is the same. (Pan's) result is a very incredible result. And before we know the facts, we can't blame anyone." Phelps said: "You can't do that to a person. I know their country has examined them under a microscope, and some of the athletes are under review... For those who have never tested positive, you can't blame them."

However, Phelps did not question the US media's previous hype about Chinese swimmers' doping. According to the New York Post on the 5th, he claimed that anyone found to have used doping should be banned for life.

Recently, the US media and institutions have been hyping up the doping scandal of Chinese swimmers, but have turned a blind eye to the suspected positive doping of their own athletes. The Global Times recently revealed that US Olympic track and field star Elijan Knighton was found to be positive for steroids (trenbolone) in March this year, but was still lifted from the suspension and eventually represented the United States in the Paris Olympics. The China Anti-Doping Center commented on the 6th that the Knighton case shows that the US Anti-Doping Agency advocates maintaining fairness and purity, but its actual behavior runs counter to this. In its statement, the China Anti-Doping Center once again strongly urged the US to stop artificially creating false narratives and pan-politicized cognitive manipulation, stop disrupting and undermining the effective world anti-doping order and governance system, and stop using so-called "legal means" to threaten and pressure and abuse "long-arm jurisdiction."

Source: Global Times