Beijing, China (Sports Network) - Hours after the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) announced U.S. swimmer Jessica Hardy tested positive for clenbuterol at the U.S. Olympic trials, the red, white and blue were dealt an even bigger blow by the International Olympic Committee when the U.S. men's 1600-meter relay team were stripped of their gold medals won at the 2000 Olympics.
The IOC disqualified the entire team on Saturday, two months after Antonio Pettigrew admitted in open court that he took EPO and human growth hormone. He gave up his gold medal in June.
Pettigrew was a member of the four-man team that consisted of the renowned Michael Johnson, who will now be known as a four-time gold medal winner of the Sydney Games, and Alvin and Calvin Harrison.
Jerome Young and Angelo Taylor ran in the preliminaries and were also stripped of their medals.
This is just another black mark for the United States in track-and-field. The now infamous Marion Jones had three gold and two bronze medals taken from her possession after she admitted using performance enhancing drugs during her reign atop the world rankings.