Simon Beck, August 21, 2008 at 4:16 PM EDT

Kudos to Ukraine as it shoots to the top of our Excellence in Doping medals table. Its star heptathlete Liudmyla Blonska stands to lose her her silver medal after testing positive for a steroid.

What an amazing achievement for Blonska, a supremely skilled performance-enhancer, who has been busted not once but twice. She was given a two-year international athletics ban after she was caught taking a steroid in 2003 and yet, through sheer strength of will, managed to resurrect her doping career in time for Beijing. Now that's a story worthy of an NBC athlete profile in soft focus with tinkly piano music in the background.

A few grumps have raised the question of why she was she allowed to take part in the Games. The IOC has been urged many times to ban doping cheats for life from Olympic events, but has failed to do so.

On the other hand, athletes protest that they are judged guilty until proven innocent, and that there are so many doping tests these days that their coaches barely have a chance to hide the syringe before someone's standing outside the training room door with a vial in his hand.

Meanwhile, Usain Bolt has tested positive for unusually high levels of ego. Not enough to make a dent in our Excellence in Doping standings table, but there's always another day.