Athletics
Semenya welcome at world champs, says World Athletics’ boss, Coe
Caster Semenya, who will make her first appearance in a world championships in five years when she competes in the women’s 5,000m in Eugene, has every right to be there, World Athletics president Sebastian Coe said Tuesday (July 19).
The South African last competed at a world championships in London in 2017 where she won her third 800m world crown.
A year later she won double gold in the 800m and 1,500m at the Commonwealth Games which is the last time she represented South Africa in a global international competition.
Semenya was forced to switch from her favoured distance to the longer event due to gender eligibility rules that required her to take testosterone-reducing drugs to compete in races between 400m to a mile.
World Athletics bars women athletes with high testosterone levels from competing in shorter races because the governing body says the hormone increases muscle mass and oxygen uptake.
Semenya, who became a world champion at 18 years of age in Berlin in 2009, has made several unsuccessful legal attempts to overturn the ruling.
“She’s eligible to be here,” Coe said of Semenya, who initially missed qualification when she only finished sixth at the African Championships last month, but has benefited from a number of athletes dropping out.
“If she chooses to compete in a distance that is not a restricted distance that’s entrirely up to her and she’ll get the same treatment and same services as any athlete that’s legitimately here,” which she is.
Semenya is just one of a handful of “restricted” athletes in Oregon, but Coe insisted he didn’t want “these athletes to go away any time soon”.
“My whole approach to this has actually been about inclusivity. I didn’t come into the sport to stop people competing.”
Coe, who won two 1,500m Olympic gold for Britain in 1980 and 1984, stressed that gender eligibility rules would not be changed any time soon.
“We’ve always been guided by the science and science is pretty clear: we know that testosterone is the key determinant in performance,” he told news agencies.
“I’m really over having any more of these discussions with second-rate sociologists who sit there trying to tell me or the science community that there may be some issue. There isn’t, testosterone is the key determinant in performance.” Coe added that it was his “responsibility to protect the integrity of women’s sport”.
“We have two categories in our sport: one is age and one is gender.
“Age because we think it’s better that Olympic champions don’t run against 14-year-olds in community sports and gender because if you don’t have a gender separation no woman would ever win another sporting event.”
Coe said current restrictions on events from the 400m to the mile were “not set in tablets of stone”.
“If we find there’s an impact in other events, we will have to take that into consideration,” he said, adding that it was “not about an individual, not about a country, not about a continent”.
When asked whether a widening of restrictions was likely, Coe responded: “I’m not going to speculate on that because I will be guided on the science.
“Only when we have really understood the impact beyond the restricted list, then that’s on the table.”
-AFP
A record 6,000 runners, local and international from across the African continent and Nigeria have registered for the second edition of the Lotus Bank Abeokuta 10km Run slated for September 28, 2024, as the organisers, Nilayo Sports Management Limited guns for a bronze label status for the race.
The Chief Operating Officer of Nilayo Sports Management Limited, Ebidowie Oweifie, noted that the theme of this year’s edition of the Abeokuta 10km Race titled ‘For Greatness’ out is out to commemorate the birthday anniversary of the Egba paramount ruler, the Alake of Egbaland, Oba Adedotun Aremu Gbadebo 111, the 10km Run will flag off at Iyana Oloke at 6am and finish at The Alake Palace, Abeokuta.
Kenya’s Peter Nwaniki is the men’s race defending champion at a time of 28 minutes 14 seconds, while Shamila Kipsirir also of Kenya is the women’s defending champion.
Nigeria’s race men’s defending champion is Francis James at 31minutes 08seconds, while the women’s defending champion is Patience Daylop at 36 minutes 31 seconds.
The second edition of Abeokuta10km Race will be sponsored by Lotus Bank, FEBBS Premium Water, Fatgbems Petroleum Limited and Cash Token.
Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan is the winner as the Court of Arbitration for Sports, CAS has rejected the appeals filed by World Athletics and WADA.
The decision confirms the decision taken by the World Athletics disciplinary tribunal finding that Tobi Amusan did not commit any anti-doping rule violation.
Here is the full statement of CAS.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has dismissed the appeals filed by
World Athletics (WA) and by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) against the decision issued on 17 August 2023 (the Challenged Decision) by the World Athletics Disciplinary Tribunal (WADT) in relation to the hurdler Oluwatobiloba (Tobi) Amusan (Nigeria).
Accordingly, the Challenged Decision in which the WADT considered that Tobi Amusan did not violate Rule 2.4 of the WA Anti-Doping Rules (WA ADR) and that no period of ineligibility should be imposed on the Athlete is confirmed.
The Athlete was initially charged with committing an Anti-Doping Rule Violation (ADRV) under Rule 2.4 WA ADR following three alleged Whereabouts Failures within a 12-month period.
In their respective appeal to CAS, WA and WADA had sought the imposition of a two-year period of ineligibility. The CAS Panel held a hearing on 19 January 2024. Having deliberated, the CAS Panel has issued its decision today dismissing both appeals. The CAS Panel unanimously acknowledged that the Athlete committed two filing failures but did not confirm the existence of a missed test, alleged by WA and WADA, which would have been the third Whereabouts Failure committed within a 12-month
period. Accordingly, the CAS Panel concluded that the Athlete did not commit an ADRV and that the Challenged Decision should be confirmed.
The reasoned award will be published by CAS unless the parties request confidentiality.
Nigeria’s Paris 2024 medal hopeful, Tobi Amusan has been cleared as the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) has dismissed the appeal filed by World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the World Athletics.
She is therefore cleared to feature at the Paris 2024 Olympics. Amusan is the 100m hurdles world record holder.
The athlete was charged in July last year with missing three anti-doping tests in 12 months but was cleared of the offence by the Disciplinary Tribunal of the sport’s governing body, World Athletics.
The Integrity Unit of the World Athletics appealed the clearance which has now been dismissed by CAS, the final arbiter in the case.
CAS in its statement remarked that its panel “unanimously acknowledged that the athlete committed two filing failures but did not confirm the existence of a missed test, alleged by WA and WADA, which would have been the third Whereabouts Failure committed within 12 months.”
Amusan set the world record of 12.12 seconds in the world championships in Eugene, Oregon, in July 2022 and went on to win the title.
She finished sixth in the world championships in Budapest last year.
World Athletics’ anti-doping rules say any athlete failing to declare their whereabouts for a doping test on three occasions over 12 months is ineligible to compete for two years.
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