China's Zhang leaps to defense of world-beating teammate Pan

China's butterfly swimmer Zhang Yufei has defended the integrity and hard work of teammate Pan Zhanle after his record-breaking Olympic Games triumph in Paris, hitting back at biased and unfair questioning of his progress by some Western media and an Australian coach.

After winning her third bronze medal at the Paris Olympics in the women's 200m butterfly，Zhang, who entered the race as defending champion, spoke to journalists and shared her thoughts on competing at her third Olympic Games, and also addressed questions regarding a proven food contamination incident more than three years ago which affected 23 Chinese swimmers, including Zhang herself.

"I don't think it's fair and ethical to have otherwise would-be confidential information of all the athletes' identities, including mine, to be leaked out just before the Paris Olympics," said Zhang, who by the end of Thursday had finished third in three events at Paris 2024, the 100m and 200m butterfly, and 4x100m freestyle relay.

"World Aquatics (swimming's governing body) has done its investigation clearly and our information was supposed to be kept confidential, according to the world anti-doping rules, to protect athletes proven no-fault in a contamination case, as we were.

"Yet the information leak resulted in our names and photos being published irresponsibly by some media, causing unwanted extra attention and distraction on my preparation for Paris," said Zhang, who won two gold medals at the Tokyo 2020 Games, in the 200m butterfly and 4x200m freestyle relay.

Before the Paris Games, both the World Anti-Doping Agency, also known as WADA, and World Aquatics had clearly stated, citing several independent probes and reviews, that the contamination outcome of the incident was solid and reasonable. All swimmers involved in the incident have been cleared of any wrongdoings and have gone through a rigorous doping test program, consistent with international regulations, to be allowed to compete in Paris.

The release of Chinese athletes' personal information in April, first by The New York Times and German broadcaster ARD has, however, caused unfair and unnecessary extra scrutiny of the team, leaving athletes mentally pressured during the Games.

"Since we've been proven innocent, it's unfair for us to be put into a situation where I personally have to concern opinions of some other countries' athletes being influenced toward us," said Zhang. "Emotionally, I feel sad that my hard training and performances would not be respected."

As an athlete not involved in the 2021 contamination incident, Pan was celebrated by fans and the majority of swimming's international community when he took 0.4 seconds off his own world record on his way to victory in Wednesday's 100m freestyle final, in a new world record time of 46.40 seconds.

Australia's runner-up Kyle Chalmers and Romanian former world record holder David Popovici, who finished third, expressed their respect for the Chinese teenager's improvement, acknowledging his record-breaking performance as motivational.

But Brett Hawke, an Australian swimming coach who is not part of the current Olympic delegation, posted outrageous speculation from afar about Pan's progress, suggesting his performance was enhanced.

"I am angry at that swim," Hawke posted on Instagram on Wednesday. "I'm upset right now because you don't win 100 freestyle by a body length on that field. You just don't do it. It is not humanly possible to beat that field by a body length."

Zhang spoke up for her younger teammate, reiterating that it is unreasonably biased to question an athlete who has fully cooperated with all relevant organizations and gone through repeated testing without a single positive result prior to and during the Games.

"Pan's cracked the 47-second barrier quite a few times over the past year on a steady rise in his training and competition," Zhang said of his improvement.

"He's been tested I don't know how many times here. If he'd violated any doping rules, as some would have speculated, WADA or World Aquatics would've already taken actions. He's a clean athlete who just worked hard to swim as fast as he could," Zhang said.