It took a long time, but now the decision has been made: German ex-biathletes Erik Lesser, Daniel Böhm, Arnd Peiffer, and Simon Schempp will retrospectively receive the relay gold medal for 2014 at the Winter Games in February.
Arnd Peiffer has revealed that he and his former teammates Erik Lesser, Daniel Böhm, and Simon Schempp will retrospectively receive the gold medal for the 2014 Sochi relay at the Olympic Winter Games in February. “We will be honored between the races,” the 38-year-old told ARD on Sunday at the biathlon event in the Schalke Veltins Arena.
“Of course, I’m looking forward to experiencing that with them again. To be an athlete again for five minutes as an ex-athlete is certainly cool. It’s great that we can enjoy this together,” Peiffer recounted, naming a positive aspect of the whole story: “In Sochi, I didn’t have any family with me at the time. That is now possible in Cortina or Antholz.”
Erik Lesser, Daniel Böhm, Arnd Peiffer and Simon Schempp retrospectively receive relay gold for Olympia 2014
He doesn’t yet know if the moment during the twelve-year-delayed award ceremony will give him goosebumps. “I can’t say that beforehand. I’m curious myself how it will feel,” said Peiffer. The teams from Austria and Norway will also be present, moving up to second and third place, thus completing the podium.
Biathlon: Russia Disqualified After Doping Violation
In mid-September, it became known that former German biathletes Lesser, Böhm, Peiffer, and Schempp would retrospectively be awarded the gold medal in the relay eleven years after the Olympic Winter Games in Sochi. The quartet had then finished second, just 3.5 seconds behind Russia.
Due to a doping violation by Evgeny Ustyugov, however, the Russian relay team was subsequently disqualified. After his retroactive ban, the Russian failed with his appeals before all judicial instances. Therefore, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) re-awarded the medals.
The affected athletes from Germany, Austria, and Norway were allowed to decide for themselves where they wanted to receive the award. With the 2026 Olympic Games, the framework for the ceremony has now been set. The Olympic biathlon competitions will take place in Antholz in February.