Russian Officials Admit to Olympic Doping in New York Times Interviews

Russian officials have admitted to Rebecca R. Ruiz of the New York Times that they were involved with doping during "the entire Olympic movement," including the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia. 

In an investigation carried out by Richard McLaren, who was appointed to do so by the World Anti-Doping Agency, it was found that illegal substances were supplied to Russian athletes in what was described by Ruiz as "one of the biggest conspiracies in sports history," which included "years' worth of cheating schemes."

McLaren had published his findings earlier in December, via Ruiz, where he stated that over 1,000 athletes across 30 sports were involved in the doping program.

His star witness was Russia’s former deputy sports minister Yuri Nagornykh and former antidoping lab director Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov, who described how they were able to get away with the scheme, via Ruiz:

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He described an operation out of a spy thriller in which he, with the guidance of sports officials and the help of members of the country’s intelligence service, broke into supposedly tamper-proof bottles every night to replace urine tainted by performance-enhancing drugs with clean urine collected months earlier.

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During the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi alone, 28 athletes were accused of doping, including "at least a dozen Russian medalists," according to Ruiz on Friday.

The International Olympic Committee was presented with the decision to ban the entire Russian team for the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro but instead withheld over 100 athletes from competing instead.

A deputy sports minister ordered that the athletes' abuse of these substances was covered up in what acting director general of Russia's national antidoping agency Anna Antseliovich and the Federal Security Service called "an institutional conspiracy."

However, Antseliovich, who was one of the officials who admitted the scandal to Ruiz, and others denied that Russian President Vladimir Putin and other top elected officials had anything to do with it. 

While there has been no word on the type of punishment that will meet the Russian Olympics Committee, the admittance of these acts will likely mean swift, harsh punishments for the country's athletic program for the upcoming 2018 Winter Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.