Andreea raducan biography

Răducan was known both for her difficult repertoire of skills as well as her dance and presentation. Over her four-year gymnastics career, she won Olympic or World Championship medals in the all-around and on every event except the uneven bars.

Born September 30, 1983, in Bârlad, Romania, Andreea Mădălina Răducan began gymnastics when she was very young. By the age of 12, she joined the junior national team at Club Sportiv Cetate Deva. She was successful in her first World Championships in 1999, in Tianjin, China. She helped her team claim the gold over Russia. She placed 5th in the all-around, won floor exercise, and placed second on balance beam.

And as talented an all-around gymnast as Răducan was, she will always be remembered for being stripped of the all-around gold she won at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. Răducan had trusted the Romanian team doctor, who gave her cold medication. A drug test revealed that the pills tested positive for ephedrine, a banned stimulant at the time.

Răducan was able to keep the gold medal that she and her Romanian teammates had won earlier, and a few days later, she earned the silver medal on vault. Răducan went to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland to get her all-around gold medal back. She was denied the request but was exonerated for anything wrong-doing by the CAS, the Romanian Olympic Committee and the International Gymnastics Federation.

Răducan did not turn her back to the sport. She competed in the 2001 Ghent World Championships, where her team won the gold again. She placed third all-around and on vault, and won gold medals on balance beam and floor exercise.

She retired from the sport in 2002. Răducan graduated with a degree in physical education from West University in Timisoara, and earned a masters in journalism from the University of Bucharest.

In 2010, she released her autobiography, “The Other Side of the Medal” which chronicled the controversial decision to strip her of her gold

Romanian gymnast

Andreea Mădălina Răducan (Romanian pronunciation:[anˈdree̯arəduˈkan]; born 30 September 1983) is a retired gymnast from Bârlad, Romania. She currently works as a sports announcer and journalist.

Răducan began competing in gymnastics at a young age and was training at the Romanian junior national facility by the age of 12. As one of the outstanding gymnasts of the Romanian team in the late 1990s, Răducan was known both for her difficult repertoire of skills and her dance and presentation. Over her four-year senior career, she won Olympic or World Championships medals on every event except the uneven bars and earned three individual World Championships titles, on the floor exercise in 1999 and 2001 and the balance beam in 2001.

Răducan competed at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, where she contributed strongly to the Romanian team's gold medal and won an individual silver medal on the vault. She was also the original winner of the all-around title, but was disqualified and stripped of her gold medal shortly after the competition concluded, when it was revealed that she had failed doping controls, testing positive for pseudoephedrine, a banned substance. She and her coaches maintained that she had been given the substance in two cold medicine pills by a Romanian team physician, and that they had not affected her performance in any way.

The case generated a significant amount of media attention, and Răducan was supported by members of the gymnastics community and the Romanian public. Her case was brought to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in autumn 2000. Răducan herself was exonerated of any personal wrongdoing by the CAS, the Romanian Olympic Committee and the International Gymnastics Federation, and was not subject to any disciplinary measures. However, her medal was not reinstated, and the team doctor who administered the medicine was banned for two Olympic cycles.

Răducan returned the year after the Olympics to w

Andreea Răducan

Andreea Răducan is a gymnast who has competed for Romania. She competed at the 2000 Summer Olympic Games. She was also the original winner of the gold medal in the individual all-around competition, but her medal was stripped after testing positive on doping. Despite being pleaded innocent by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the former results were not reinstated. Her doping controls for the apparatus finals and the team final were clean.

Olympic Results[]

2000[]

After the competition, the International Olympic Committee announced that Andreea Răducan had tested positive for pseudoephedrine, which was a banned substance at the time. Despite the appeals submitted by the Romanian Olympic Committee and the Romanian Gymnastics Federation, the decision to disqualify the Romanian gymnast remained final. Under these conditions, the gold medal was awarded to Simona Amânar, Maria Olaru received the silver medal, and Liu Xuan (China) received the bronze medal. Andreea Răducan kept the medals from the team competition and from vaulting (gold and silver).

Both Andreea Răducan and the officials of the Romanian gymnastics team always supported the gymnast's innocence. The team doctor was found guilty of negligence, because he administered the gymnast with a medicine for cold and flu, which contained a prohibited substance; as a result, he was suspended until the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Romanian gymnasts openly declared that the gold medal in the individual all-around belongs to Andreea by right. After announcing the disqualification decision, both Simona Amânar and Maria Olaru said that they intended to refuse the new medals as a sign of protest; however, the final decision was to accept the new ranking, in order to improve the classification of the entire Romanian delegation. Simona Amânar said about the gold medal: “I didn't win it. It was won by Andreea, and it belongs to Andreea ".

"She won the unconditional sympathy of millions of people around the world"

The decision to disqualify Andreea Răducan was challenged at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in the autumn of 2000. Although it was admitted that the Romanian gymnast's performance was not influenced by the medicine taken, the arbitration commission refused to overturn the International Olympic Committee's ruling. Andreea lost this Olympic title in the individual all-around final, but won the unconditional sympathy of millions of people around the world, followin