Andrus Veerpalu

Andrus Veerpalu (born 8 February 1971) is a retired Estonian cross-country skier. He is Estonia's most successful Winter Olympian, having won the gold medal in men's 15 km classical in 2002 and 2006, and silver in men's 50 km classical in 2002.

Career On 17 February 2006 Veerpalu won his second Winter Olympics gold medal (in 15 km cross country skiing; his previous gold medal is from the Salt Lake City games), becoming the fourth Estonian to have won two Olympic gold medals (Kristjan Palusalu, Erika Salumäe and Kristina Šmigun-Vähi are the first three). He is the most successful Olympic athlete from Estonia with three medals. (Kristina Šmigun-Vähi tied that record at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics)

Veerpalu has also found success at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships, winning a gold at 15 km in 2009 at Liberec, 30 km in 2001 at Lahti and a silver at 50 km in 1999 at Ramsau. He has also won the 50 km event at the Holmenkollen ski festival in 2003 and 2005. Veerpalu also competed in the men's 50 km, Mass Start Classic at the 2010 Winter Olympics, finishing at the 6th place.

Veerpalu became the oldest world champion in history with his victory at Liberec 2009 on the 15 km classical event. He was then 38 years old. He is also the oldest Olympic champion in individual distance.

Veerpalu earned the Holmenkollen medal in 2005, the first Estonian to do so.

Veerpalu is the fourth athlete to compete in cross-country skiing at six Winter Olympics, after Marja-Liisa Kirvesniemi, Harri Kirvesniemi, and Jochen Behle. (Kateřina Neumannová is also a cross-country skier who competed at six Olympics, but one of her appearances was in cycling.)

On 23 February 2011, Veerpalu announced that he will end his professional sportsman career due to a chronic knee injury.

Doping case acquittal

Several months after Veerpalu's retirement it was announced that he had tested positive for HGH (growth hormone), however he had pleaded innocent in HGH treatment. Estonian biochemistry doctors explained that the verdict was untimely and that there was no reliable method to distinguish artificial HGH from natural background hormone. Veerpalu appealed the test result to the FIS. The FIS antidoping commission found Veerpalu guilty and extended his ban to three years, due to Veerpalu's team's lack of co-operation with FIS. A group of top Estonian biochemists investigated the matter and insist Veerpalu was a false positive. The Court of Arbitration for Sport acquitted Veerpalu, lifted his doping ban and ordered the FIS to pay a part of Veerpalu's court costs on 25 March 2013. The court stated "that there are many factors in this case which tend to indicate that the Athlete did in fact himself administer exogenous hGH" but found that the decision limit, the threshold for considering the result an adverse analytical finding, was not sufficiently reliable to uphold the doping conviction. Krista Fischer, a senior researcher for the Estonian Genome Center, questioned what these unexplained factors hinted at by CAS could be: "So what were these factors? Right now the only numbers that seem to hint at doping are the same four numbers that have been ruled invalid."

Cross-country skiing results All results are sourced from the International Ski Federation (FIS).

Olympic Games 3 medals – (2 gold, 1 silver) Year Age 10 km 15 km Pursuit 30 km 50 km Sprint 4 × 10 km relay Team sprint 1992 21 21 42 44 — 10 1994 23 36 55 — 26 — 1998 27 8 19 — 10 2002 31 Gold — — Silver — 9 2006 35 Gold — — — 8 — 2010 39 — — 6 — — —

World Championships 3 medals – (2 gold, 1 silver) Year Age 10 km 15 km Pursuit 30 km 50 km Sprint 4 × 10 km relay Team sprint 1993 22 49 57 31 — 15 1995 24 72 DNS 30 DNF 11 1997 26 32 — 39 11 1999 28 14 — Silver 10 2001 30 5 — Gold — — 7 2003 32 8 4 — — 8 2005 34 — 19 4 — 9 — 2009 38 Gold 19 — — 8 8

World Cup Season standings Season Age Discipline standingsSki Tour standingsOverallDistanceLong DistanceMiddle DistanceSprintNordicOpeningTour deSkiWorld CupFinal 1992 21 1993 22 1994 23 78 1995 24 73 1996 25 1997 26 74 60 59 1998 27 26 24 28 1999 28 22 12 43 2000 29 43 23 51 36 2001 30 42 — 2002 31 19 2003 32 7 — 2004 33 7 6 23 2005 34 13 10 58 2006 35 — — — 2008 37 50 34 77 — 22 2009 38 27 20 77 19 — 2010 39 41 20 108 — 2011 40 86 50 — —

Individual podiums 6 victories – (6 ) 11 podiums – (11 )

Note: Until the 1999 World Championships, World Championship races were included in the World Cup scoring system.

Personal life He is married to Angela Veerpalu and they have five children.