Sixty-seven Russian athletes are planning to apply to the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) to compete at the Olympic Games in August, despite their country’s suspension for state-sponsored doping, Russian Minister of Sport Vitaly Mutko said on Saturday.
The IAAF Council on June 17 decided to maintain a ban on Russian track and field competitors in Rio after findings of drug test violations, including ignored positive and altered test results.
However, the IAAF left the door ajar and clean athletes could still compete in Rio if they can prove they have not been tainted by the disgraced Russian system.
However, the figure of 67 seems unrealistic, because the IAAF has strict criteria, limiting applications to athletes who train outside Russia, which would exclude pole vault star Yelena Isinbayeva and 110m hurdles world champion Sergey Shubenkov.
“Tomorrow, 67 Russian athletes will submit their individual requests to participate in the Olympic Games, which they have the right to,” Mutko told Russian TV.
“It will be a huge failure for me if the entire Russian team is excluded,” Mutko said. “I’m ready to assume my responsibilities and resign.”
“I’m not the one pushing the athletes to dope, but if there are failures, that means that I’m not working as I should,” Mutko added.
The athletes are also running out of time, because they must submit their application at least two weeks before the event they want to compete in, with the Olympics beginning on Aug. 5.
The applications are then to be submitted to a “doping review board,” which would examine the validity of their claims.
Russian weightlifters also risk missing the Olympics after the sport’s governing body, the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF), put Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus on notice that they face being banned over repeated doping offenses.
According to the IWF, at least three Russians tested positive in retests of samples from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics in Beijing and London.
The suspension is to be confirmed once the International Olympic Committee has “disqualified” the offending athletes.
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