'How badly our victories unnerve our colleagues': Russian Olympic Committee tweets about doping claims

TOKYO – The Russians have heard the complaints about their presence in these Olympics and, frankly, they don’t care.

With three athletes complaining about the country’s doping history in the last day after losing to Russian athletes, the official Twitter account of the Russian Olympic Committee rhetorically spiked the ball.

“English propaganda is oozing verbal sweat onto the Tokyo Games. Through the mouths of athletes offended by defeats,” the ROC tweeted.

“We will not console you. We’ll forgive those who are weaker. God is their judge. He is our helper.”

Swimmers Ryan Murphy and Britain’s Luke Greenbank, the silver and bronze medalists in the 200-meter backstroke, respectively, on Friday complained about competing against Russian athletes. Russian Evgeny Rylov won gold in that race.

“It is a huge mental drain on me … that I’m swimming in a race that’s probably not clean,” Murphy said.

Added Greenbank, “It’s frustrating knowing there's a state-sponsored doping program going on and not more being done to tackle that.”

Rower Megan Kalmoe, a four-time Olympian, tweeted Thursday her frustration about Russian rowers Vasilisa Stephanova and Elena Oriabinskaia, who took silver in women’s pair final.

“Seeing a crew who shouldn’t even be here walk away with a silver is a nasty feeling,” Kalmoe tweeted.

The Russian Olympic Committee included photos of the three athletes in its tweets.

“How badly our victories unnerve our colleagues,” ROC tweeted. “Yes, we are here at the Olympics. Absolutely rightfully so. Whether some people like it or not. You have to know how to lose. But not everyone can. And here we go again – the same old song about Russian doping is played by the old music box. Someone is diligently turning the handle.”

Russians are competing here as the Russian Olympic Committee, the result of a Court of Arbitration for Sport decision that affirmed investigations by the World Anti-Doping Agency but reduced the sanctions.

Since late 2014, multiple WADA investigations revealed state-sponsored doping programs that ran from 2011 to 2015 and involved more than 1,000 athletes in at least 30 sports. WADA found Russia subverted anti-doping protocols in two Olympics, including swapping out dirty urine for clean samples through a hole in the wall during the Sochi Games.

Though WADA asked for a four-year ban, CAS reduced it to two years. The sanction is in name only, for the most part. Russian athletes cannot wear their flag or hear their anthem when they win a gold medal – Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 plays– but they still wear their country’s colors.

They are officially designated as the Russian Olympic Committee rather than Russia, but that’s semantics. The ROC puts the team forward for every Games.

With 335 athletes, the team is one of the largest here.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Olympics: Russian Olympic Committee tweets about doping claims