Dimitrij Ovtcharov

Dimitrij Ovtcharov (Russian: Дмитрий Овчаров) or Dmytro Ovtcharov (Ukrainian: Дмитро Овчаров; born 2 September 1988) is a Ukrainian-born German table tennis player. His father Mikhail (or Mikhaylo), a Soviet table tennis champion in 1982, moved his family to Germany shortly after Dimitrij was born.

Since 2008, Ovtcharov has won a total of two silver and four bronze medals at the Olympics, making him second most decorated male Olympian in the table tennis category in terms of the number of medals awarded. Ranked first January to February 2018, he is ranked ninth in the world by the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) as of November 2022.

Career

At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Ovtcharov won the silver medal as part of the German men's team, together with Timo Boll and Christian Süß.

He used a special technique in his serves, which was later picked by Time magazine as one of the top 50 innovations of 2008.

On 22 September 2010, Ovtcharov had been suspended by the German Table Tennis Federation (DTTB) due to a positive A-sample test for Clenbuterol that may be used as a performance-enhancing substance. Ovtcharov himself denied the doping accusation and requested a B-sample analysis which still tested positive. After hearings and further investigations, the hair sample voluntarily offered by Ovtcharov showed no evidence of clenbuterol and its abuse. DTTB later unanimously decided to cancel the suspension on 15 October 2010. The decision was endorsed by ITTF.