Jamaica’s Chelsea Hammond, despite missing out on the excitement of being on the podium, is glad for the Olympic medal that she patiently awaited since 2008.
Hammond did a personal best of 6.79m on the day, just missing out on the anthem ceremony.
Eight years after, Tatiana Lebedeva, now 40-year-old, collected the silver medal in the long jump, got disqualified.
According to the IOC, Lebedeva “is found to have committed an anti-doping rule violation pursuant to the IOC Anti-Doping Rules applicable to the Games of the XXIX Olympiad in Beijing in 2008 (presence and/or use of a Prohibited Substance or its Metabolites or Markers in an athlete’s bodily specimen),” The release continued to say she is now “disqualified from the events in which she participated upon the occasion of the Olympic Games Beijing 2008, namely, the women’s triple jump event and the women’s long jump event in which she twice ranked 2nd and for which she was consequently awarded in each case the silver medal.”
Hammond said: “I have been patiently waiting for medal since August 22nd 2008. I walked out the Birds Nest Stadium after placing 4th thinking btw (by the way), the Brazilian girl and the Russian girl that one of them would fail their drug test. Well today is that day! The 2nd place finisher from Russia tested positive.”
The New York City-born long jumper continued in her social media note, “I will never experience someone throwing me a flag from the stands to take a victory lap. I wont know how it feels to step up on the podium on a stage as big as the Olympics to receive a medal for an accomplishment many said I could never achieve. I don’t even want to think about the money I missed out on. But despite it all I thank the Most High for this blessing no matter how late. And now I can tell my kids their mommy is a Olympic medalist.”