Thread by @sportingintel, If you've seen the Oscar-winning documentary Icarus and found the film and [...]

If you've seen the Oscar-winning documentary Icarus and found the film and related matters interesting / fascinating then there's a fairly significant development about to break, soonish, in this thread. 1/n

Grigory Rodchenkov, the former head of the Moscow lab who was at the heart of Russia's state-sponsored doping scheme, has written his autobiography, out next Friday, and serialised in this weekend's MoS. 2/n

If you don't know who Rodchenkov is, or about the Russian doping plot, then a recap about how the MoS first exposed him, and the plot, in 2013. A story that @marthakelner and I could barely believe was true even as we filed it. 3/n

http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2016/07/25/exposed-the-story-behind-the-story-of-russia-doping-and-the-ioc-250701/

So, the first extracts of Rodchenkov's book are up online now, here. https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/sport/sportsnews/article-8560231/Grigory-Rodchenkov-falsified-Russian-athletes-drug-tests-country-got-Olympic-ban.html

But. There is some more absolutely ASTONISHING stuff to come. Shortly.

4/n

Interesting to see Kremlin's reaction to what is about to follow. When 2013 story ran, there was the usual diversionary B/S from Mutko. And the story stood up.

Expecting a geopolitical rumble from this, and renewed threats on Rodchenkov's life.

5/n

There are spreads in the MoS news pages and sports pages. This is how the news spread looks. (Link to piece earlier in thread).

In global sports politics & doping terms, the dynamite to follow, shortly.

6/n

First BOMBSHELL from Rodchenkov: Soviet boycott of LA Games in 1984 wasn't tit for tat over 1980; it was because Don Catlin had such good testing, Russia's steroid-fuelled would have been obliterated. USSR planned secret offshore lab but were thwarted

7/n

Second BOMBSHELL from Rodchenkov: at the Moscow-based 'Goodwill Games' of 1986, the host nation covered-up 14 drug tests. Including the winner of the men's 100m final: Ben Johnson. For stanozolol. 2 yrs before Seoul. Rodchenkov did the 1986 analysis. 8/n

Third BOMBSHELL from Rodchenkov: there are Russian Olympic champions hitherto untarnished by doping allegations who Rodchenkov outs as massive dopers. 9/n

You can read about all these BOMBSHELLS, here, now: https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/sport/sportsnews/article-8560165/Weve-cheated-decades-Whistleblowers-explosive-revelations-Russia.html

I spoke to Ben Johnson to ask him about this, and he said nobody told him at the time, and beyond that couldn't comment. I hadn't spoken to Ben since I spent an extraordinary evening with him in 2013. 11/n

https://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/sport/othersports/article-2408056/Ben-Johnson-My-journey-hell-Gaddafi-Diego-Maradona.html

To conclude. Icarus was amazing, as you'll know if you've seen it. Rodchenkov's book is an extraordinary insight into his life and times, and Soviet / Russian sport. I highly recommend it. Extracts can only tell you so much. Goodnight!

About to go to bed but ... have said this before and believe it as firmly today: without @bryanfogel & his film & his intervention, Grigory Rodchenkov would be dead already, and none of this story would ever have been (properly) told. So Bryan,

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