STADNIK Mariya

General
OLYMPIC MEDAL COLLECTION
She hopes to complete her collection of Olympic medals with a gold at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, and says she plans to open a wrestling school after her competitive career is finished. "An Olympic gold medal is the main thing missing from my collection. Of course, this is my main ambition but it's not the only thing I am thinking about. I want to open my own wrestling school in the future, and I want my name to be remembered in the history books." (moscow-baku.ru, 25 Sep 2019)

FROM UKRAINE TO AZERBAIJAN
She previously competed for Ukraine, but switched to represent Azerbaijan in 2007. "I have been competing for Azerbaijan since 2007. At that time, my interests and the interests of the Ukrainian team were different, and a conflict arose. Another Ukrainian wrestler was the priority for the national team and they told me to wait, but I didn't want to. During this time, the Azerbaijani team was recruiting women to their team. I received a proposal to compete for them, and having weighed up all the options, I agreed." (24tv.ua, 27 Feb 2020; SportsDeskOnline, 22 Jul 2015; glavred.info, 29 Oct 2007)

SANCTION
In April 2006, while representing Ukraine, she tested positive for the banned substance furosemide at the European championships in Moscow, Russian Federation. She was initially suspended for one year by FILA [now UWW], which was later increased by FILA to two years in September 2006. In November the same year, the Ukrainian Wrestling Association claimed that further investigation revealed that Stadnik's teammate at the time, Vera Tkhorovska, confessed to having spiked Stadnik's water bottle, resulting in multiple appeals to FILA for a reduction of the sanction, which was granted in June 2007 and the suspension reduced to 15 months. Following this, Stadnik competed at the world championships in 2007 for Azerbaijan and the European championships in 2008. In October 2007, the World Anti-Doping Agency [WADA] appealed the reduction to the Court of Arbitration for Sport [CAS], which was granted, and in July 2008 CAS sanctioned Stadnik with a two-year period of ineligibility backdated from 26 April 2006 to 25 April 2008, and disqualified all results obtained during this period. She unsuccessfully appealed the CAS decision to the Swiss Federal Supreme Court. (jurisprudence.tas-cas.org, 17 Jul 2008; Swiss International Sports Arbitration Reports Case No. 23 p.405, 17 Mar 2009)

She became the first athlete representing Azerbaijan to win three Olympic medals when she won silver at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. Fellow Azerbaijani wrestler Khetag Goziumov also won a third Olympic medal in Rio de Janeiro several days after Stadnik. (SportsDeskOnline, 01 Feb 2020)