Adam Nelson recently has been in the news. The New York Times reported in December that Adam ascended to first place in the shot put more than eight years after the 2004 Olympic Games in Greece, when doping officials ruled that Yuriy Bilonog, the Ukrainian athlete who originally won the gold, was guilty of using performance-enhancing drugs. Steroids were detected when Bilonog’s sample was reanalyzed, and he was subsequently stripped of his gold medal, along with three other track-and-field athletes whose samples were reanalyzed and tested positive for steroids.


According to the Times, doping protocols allow for officials to store samples for eight years and retest them for substances they may not have been able to detect at the time the sample was taken. The results of Bilonog’s sample were negative in 2004, but eight years later, with new tests at their disposal, officials reexamined about 100 samples from the Athens Games, focusing on certain sports and medalists.


Now Adam may receive the gold medal that he narrowly lost in a tiebreaker in 2004, when the shot put was staged at the site of the original ancient Olympics in Olympia, Greece. 


“I’m still processing this one, but the 2004 Olympics were a really special moment for me,” Adam told the Times. “My wife was there, a bunch of my friends from college, my family. We competed at the birthplace of the Olympic Games. The downside of this is I feel like our country was robbed of a medal at the relevant time. One of the biggest parts of an Olympic career is when you hear your anthem and see your flag when you stand on that podium. That’s something I can never replace.” 


According to the International Olympic Committee, track-and-field’s world governing body now will decide whether to officially alter the standings or void the positions of the stripped athletes. An Olympic gold medal would be a crowning achievement for Adam, who recently decided to retire from the shot put, ending what Sports Illustrated referred to as “one of the most distinguished throwing careers of any U.S. athlete.” He has a silver medal from the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, silver medals from the 2001 world championships in Edmonton, the 2002 world championships in Paris, the 2007 world championships in Osaka, and a gold medal from the 2005 world championships in Helsinki. Adam is now an officer in the track-and-field athletes association, which has challenged an International Olympic Committee regulation that limits how athletes can promote their sponsors.


“I felt like I was leaving the sport better than it was when I started,” Adam told the Times. “And that’s a big thing. There are ways for me to stay involved without training. I want to help athletes have a voice, and that’s become a real passion for me.” 


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—Jason Casell, 6426 Needle Leaf Drive, Rockville, MD 20852; jhcasell@gmail.com