IAAF issues guidelines on Russian track athletes

Russian athletes will file a class action suit against the ban preventing their participation in the Rio Olympic Games, as Russia’s sports minister said a decision to prevent its weightlifters from competing was “psychotic”.

The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) announced on Thursday that it amended the organization’s regulations in order to allow field and track athletes from Russia to submit individual applications for international tournaments.

By forcing Kenyan athletes to undergo additional drugs tests, the International Olympic Committee is trying to intimidate his countrymen, said a former running champion.

The IWF has also ordered sanctions on countries including North Korea, Romania, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova because of doping cases during the qualification period for the Olympics.

With the vast majority of Russian athletes training at home, the IAAF has already indicated that only “very few” athletes will be get through the “crack in the door”, and some observers have speculated that could be as few as three or four competitors.

Russia’s athletes compete during the National track and field championships at a stadium earlier this week. “The IAAF will now work with the International Olympic Committee to ensure the decision is respected and implemented in full”. Bach also lamented “deficiencies” in global drug-testing and urged the World Anti-Doping Agency to hold a special conference next year to address the problems.

The IWF statement said: “The IWF fully identifies with the content of the declaration of the Olympic summit stating that all the stakeholders of the Olympic movement must do their utmost to ensure that only clean athletes should be able to participate in the Rio 2016 Olympic Games”.

Kenya has come under scrutiny from the IAAF and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) over its flagging doping system, necessitating changes to legislation to avoid expulsion of its world-beating distance runners from August’s Rio de Janeiro Olympics. The summit, which also cited “substantial allegations” against those countries, put the onus on each worldwide sports federation to make sure their athletes are clean ahead of the Rio Games.

The IWF has set up an independent commission to investigate the nations who returned three or more positives from the retesting of 2008 and 2012 samples, which was carried out after advances in science enabled better detection of prohibited substances. These athletes will be removed from disqualifications individually by the IAAF.