The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) rejected the appeal of 68 Russian athletes against their ban from the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
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The court was ruling on a decision by track and field’s top global body, the worldwide Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), to keep Russia’s national track and field federation suspended from Rio.
Individually, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is contemplating calls to ban all Russian opponents across all sports in the Rio Games following another report into state-sponsored doping.
The Russian Olympic Committee said it meant to take 387 sportsmen and women to Rio, including 68 track-and-field athletes who are now appealing a doping ban at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Switzerland.
Responding to news Russia’s appeal has been dismissed, IAAF President Sebastian Coe said he was “thankful that our rules and our power to uphold our rules and the anti-doping code have been supported”.
WADA said Monday the International Olympic Committee should bar all Russian teams from competing, not just track and field.
A second WADA-backed investigation has now revealed that a similar doping programme extended to nearly all Olympic and Paralympic sports in Russian Federation. They had made an appeal for being allowed to compete in Rio Olympics.
The prohibition was put in effect in November, following a report from the World Anti-Doping Agency that detailed how Russian track officials conspired with coaches, athletes and former leaders of the IAAF to cover up positive drug tests.
“Unfortunately, the introduction of collective responsibility has created some precedent, but we had not expected anything different”, Mutko told the Russian news agency, Interfax.
Now the Cas ruling has cleared the way for more to follow. “I should say it once again – the final decision will be announced by IOC President Tomas Bach”, she added.
In practice, that ruled out nearly the entire team, as the vast majority of Russian athletes train at home, where the IAAF and WADA have said the anti-doping system still can not be trusted.
Dmitry Shlyakhtin, the president of the All-Russia Athletics Federation (ARAF), believes the ruling has ended any hopes of a successful outcome.
Some Russians athletes could compete in Rio as neutrals if they meet a number of criteria, including being repeatedly tested outside their homeland.
“I’ll definitely be there, I’m excited to go”, said Bolt.
The country’s sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, has since apologised for Russia’s failure to catch cheating athletes but stopped short of admitting the scandal had been state-sponsored.
“I was afraid that CAS would actually find in favour of them”, said Kiernan, who represented his country in the men’s marathon at the 1984 Games in LA.
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The move comes after revelations by the McLaren report, compiled by Dr Richard McLaren that found evidence of manipulation of urine samples of athletes across a majority of summer and winter Olympic sport events.
