Light-Heavyweight (≤85 kilograms), Men

The favorite was Belarussian Andrey Rybakov, silver medalist at Athinai in 2004, and World Champion in 2006-07. He opened with 185.0 kg in the snatch to take a 5 kg lead over China’s Lu Yong. Rybakov lifted 209.0 in the snatch, but when Lu apparently lifted 214 kg on his second attempt, he seemed to have the gold medal, tying Rybakov with 394.0 kg, but Lu weighed less than Rybakov. The Chinese officials started celebrating but the judges then ruled that the lift was not legal. Lu made his third attempt with the same weight and this time cleanly lifted 214.0 kg and the gold medal was his. Bronze went to Armenia’s Tigran V. Martirosyan, whose teammate and namesake, Tigran G. Martirosyan (no known relation), had also won a bronze medal in the lightweight class in Beijing. Rybakov competed again in this class at the London Olympics, attempting to finally win his gold medal, but he failed to complete a clean lift and was eliminated.

That was how the event and the results seemed to have ended. In 2015, however, the IOC began re-testing samples from the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Olympics, using newer, more advanced testing techniques, in an effort to find those who had used performance enhancing drugs (PEDs), but in whom it could not be detected at the time of those Olympics. This was one of the many events affected.

In October 2016 Belarussian Andrey Rybakov had a positive re-test for turinabol (dehydrochloromethyltestosterone) and stanozolol, and was disqualified, losing his silver medal, which was re-assigned to Armenian lifter Tigran Martirosyan, with Cuban Jadier Valladares moving up to the bronze medal, after the original fourth-place finisher, Vladimir Sedov of Kazakhstan, also had a positive re-test for stanozolol, which was announced in November 2016.