The World Anti-Doping Agency is set to ignore the clamour from outraged athletes and national doping federations and relax its ban on RussiaHas a performance ever felt less enhanced than that of the World Anti‑Doping Agency? The body notionally responsible for keeping sport clean is on the brink of lifting Russia’s doping ban, about 10 minutes after that country’s state agents were discovered to have spent much of the Sochi Winter Olympics passing clean piss through a hole in a testing lab wall, and swapping it with athlete piss marginally less tainted than the lake inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone.But hey. Russia would like you to know that they’re just not those people any more. I imagine the speech requesting...
Britain’s London 2012 long jump champion once had his achievements branded a fluke but he is now ready to again defy critics of his lofty ambitionsYou know how Greg Rutherford celebrated his first day as a retired athlete? By turning up at the Whitley Bay junior Parkrun on Sunday morning to be a tail walker, chatting to kids from four to 14, and turning what might have felt like a 2km slog into a chance to high-five an Olympic champion. But Rutherford gets it. He understands that being a role model starts – not ends – with winning medals, although he was damn good at that too.Has any British sports star squeezed so much pith and pulp from high class...
This week’s roundup also includes Nigel Benn in his pomp, a massive crash and the Jarrow Arrow doing his thing1) The knockout stage of the World Cup begins this weekend, as good an excuse as any to relive the brilliant 1990 version. Diego Maradona “vaccinates” Brazil, facilitating one of the greatest robberies of all time with one of the greatest assists; Dragan Stojkovic scores two jazzers as Yugoslavia beat Spain; “a nation holds its breath” waiting for David O’Leary’s penalty to give the Republic of Ireland victory over Romania; Toto Schillaci does it again, taking Italy past Uruguay; Tomas Skurahvy bags a hat-trick of headers for Czechoslovakia against Costa Rica; West Germany edge past Netherlands in a battle for the...
The case is complex but demanding some female athletes lower their testosterone levels was a big call, yet seems to be a debatable conclusion to reach based on a questionable studyThey say there are six tics that tell you when someone’s bluffing. When it comes to Caster Semenya and the IAAF, here’s a seventh. Be wary of anyone who says it’s all straightforward. The Semenya case isn’t just about sport, or sex, or gender, but ethics, politics, culture, race, and science. Expert opinion is split. Which is why the arguments have been going back and forth for the best part of a decade, and the case now seems bound to return to the court of arbitration for sport, where they...
With the Heritage Collection the IAAF wants to yoke the sport’s present to its glorious past but there was an aspect missing from the president’s speech at the launchAt midday last Sunday, Sebastian Coe launched the IAAF’s scheme to get people interested in athletics. It is called the Heritage Collection and is a display of old athletics artefacts, medals, programmes, papers, odd bits of kit from out of the attic, Stacy Dragila’s vest and Jason Gardener’s spikes.The idea, Lord Coe explained, was to win “long-term loyalty of young fans” by showing the “historic context” of the sport. Coe spoke about taking the display on the road but ultimately the International Association of Athletics Associations wants to put it all in a...