Georgia's Olympic bronze medallist Anton Pliesnoi has been provisionally suspended after testing positive for banned drugs ©Getty Images

The International Weightlifting Federation’s (IWF) decision to toughen up on doping by handing over all procedures to the International Testing Agency (ITA) has led to a Ukrainian coach being banned from the sport for life.

Punishing coaches was unheard of when the IWF policed doping itself, but this is the third time since the IWF-ITA deal was signed in October in  2020 that a coach has been kicked out of weightlifting.

The Egyptian Khaled Korany was banned just over two years ago, and the Thailand coach Liu Ning, from China, was next to go last May.

Now Matsokha Mykhailo has been given a life ban for "tampering and complicity" in relation to an offence by his athlete Dmytro Chumak, a triple European champion for Ukraine and a multiple medallist at the IWF World Championships at weights ranging from 94 kilograms to 109kg.

Chumak, 32, sixth at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, is provisionally suspended after being charged with evading testers and attempted bribery in May 2021.

Matsokha Mykhailo, the coach of Ukraine's Dmytro Chumak, pictured, has been given a life ban from weightlifting for
Matsokha Mykhailo, the coach of Ukraine's Dmytro Chumak, pictured, has been given a life ban from weightlifting for "tampering and complicity" ©Getty Images

The ITA has also revealed that another medallist from the re-arranged 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo has been provisionally suspended - Anton Pliesnoi from Georgia - and that Pakistan’s top lifter, the Olympian Talha Talib, has accepted a three-year suspension.

Current suspensions, provisional or confirmed, feature on a new page on the ITA’s website rather than on the IWF’s site, which will continue to list historic sanctions.

It is all part of a new approach to anti-doping by the IWF, whose President Mohamed Jalood said last month,"We have put our full confidence in and trust the work of the ITA. 

"We want a clean sport and the ITA will help us in that."

Pliesnoi tested positive at the 2021 IWF World Championships in Tashkent for ligandrol (SARMS LGD-4033), an androgen receptor modulator whose benefits are widely discussed in the online CrossFit community.

His provisional suspension, in an ongoing case, has only just been been announced by the ITA, which is working under strict privacy laws in Europe.

Although Pliesnoi’s alleged offence, long rumoured within weightlifting, has only now been made public, he was the first Tokyo 2020 medallist to test positive after the Games.

He won a bronze in the 96kg category. 

The other two were Zacarias Bonnat of Dominican Republic, also for SARMS, and the triple champion Lu Xiaojun of China, for erythropoietin, both announced in the past four weeks after out-of-competition tests in October and November.

Pakistan's Talha Talib, who competed at Tokyo 2020, has been banned for three-years after a doping offence ©Getty Images
Pakistan's Talha Talib, who competed at Tokyo 2020, has been banned for three-years after a doping offence ©Getty Images

Other athletes may have tested positive without appearing on the new sanctions list, the ITA explained.

Privacy laws, especially relating to those aged under 18, will be the main reason.

The ITA states above the list of suspended weightlifters, "The information below does not necessarily provide an exhaustive overview of all the sanctions imposed… insofar as other Anti-Doping Organisations may have imposed sanctions on the individuals under their own rules.

"The ITA wishes to clarify that some of the cases are not final and may be in dispute before first instance hearing panels or the Court of Arbitration for Sport."