London Marathon ‘very concerned’ by doping claims

The Sunday Times has claimed that the London marathon had been won seven times in 12 years – almost 30% of the winners of the 24 men’s and women’s races – by athletes who recorded suspicious blood scores.

The Sunday Times is now reporting that, since 2003, seven winners, six runners-up and seven third-placed finishers at the London Marathon have recorded blood results that were “deemed suspicious”. The suspected athletes were not named.

Double Olympic champion Mo Farah wants his anti-doping blood test data to be made public, saying he will do what it takes to prove he is a clean athlete.

It claimed more than 800 athletes had suspicious blood test results which were not followed up by the global Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). We were the first people to call for blood testing and in fact we’re still probably the only event in the world that blood tests all our athletes.

On 7 August, the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) said it would urgently launch an investigation into the damning allegations, but decried the manner in which confidential blood test results were leaked to the media.

London is a member of the World Marathon Majors alongside the events in Boston, Chicago, New York, Berlin and Tokyo – the other races included in the latest part of the Sunday Times investigation.

British Athletics feared releasing selective data could be “misinterpreted” and may also imply those not publishing their data were “guilty by omission”, while The Sunday Times said lawyers for the IAAF had written to the newspaper suggesting athletes were not aware of the implications of putting the data in the public domain.

“I ask that any athlete, or anti-doping organisation, concerned that their rights are being eroded or inappropriately challenged refer those concerns to the commission, which intends to commence its work immediately”. Also, it might mean that any athlete not publishing their data is somehow guilty by omission. The IAAF has agreed to give its full database to the anti-doping body.

British Athletics chairman Ed Warner said: “We believe that selective publication in this way could be misinterpreted”.

The IAAF, however, has condemned the leak, and said the two experts had “no knowledge whatsoever of the actions taken by the IAAF in following these suspicious profiles” and that their analysis “contains a number of seriously incorrect assertions”. “This data could not possibly be considered doping, legally or otherwise”, he said.

“The London Marathon does not see the results of the tests and is therefore only informed if there is an adverse result from a test carried out at the London Marathon”.

In a statement Sunday, London Marathon chief executive Nick Bitel said organizers are “determined to make marathon running a safe haven from doping but we can not do it all on our own”.

Earlier this week, the Russian Liliya Shobukhova was stripped of her three Chicago marathon titles and 2010 London win, with all her results from 2009 onwards annulled.

“We feel that is the best way of ensuring our sport is clean”, he said. The Sunday Times claims that she recorded “extreme blood scores” for nine years before the athletics authorities finally took action against her in 2014, and that marathon organisers were not told about the scores.