Valieva: No more 15-year-old skaters at big events says Italian federation head

(ANSA) - ROME, FEB 18 - Italy is in favour of raising the minimum age of athletes taking part in major events, Italian Ice Sport Federation President Andrea Gios said Friday in the wake of the case of Kamila Valieva, the 15-year-old Russian figure skater at the centre of a doping row at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.
    He said the next congress of the International Skating Union will discuss raising the minimum age for major events to 17 as a stepping stone to taking it up to 18.
    "Italy supports this as necessary, along with many other countries," Gios said, adding that the reform could be speeded up in view of the Milano-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics.
    "It's not in the interest of sport to have 15-year-old champions who vanish after a year.
    "Champions must last and go down in history like Katarina Witt, Carolina Kostner.
    "This girl (Valieva) has been massacred. She wasn't able to skate, the same girl who was doing extraordinary things," he added after the Russian failed to make the podium on Thursday, having fallen twice in her final routine.
    "How is it possible that a doping test done in December wasn't made public until the Olympics.
    "The Russians would have sent someone else and all this would not have happened (if the result had been announced before).
    "We have thrown a 15-year-old girl into the lions' pit for a a test done two months ago". (ANSA).