However, it also said neither she nor any Russian athlete with a doping past would be eligible for the Games.
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Her husband worked for the Russian anti-doping agency (RUSADA) and was also key in exposing the malpractices of the system which saw a host of positive tests by Russian athletes disappear.
“The IGF has reviewed the IOC EB decision with regards to the entry of Russian athletes at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games”.
UNSANITARY ACCOMMODATIONS: The Olympic team of Belarus has branded the athletes’ village in Rio de Janeiro unsanitary, a day after Australia refused to check its athletes in over health concerns.
Stepanov, who previously worked for Russia’s anti-doping agency, and his wife helped expose the doping scandal which threatened to exclude Russian Federation from the Olympics.
IOC President Thomas Bach, however, announced on July 24 that Russian athletes, with the exception of field and track competitors, were allowed to participate in the 2016 Summer Olympics based on individual approval of each respective worldwide sports federation or association.
FISA said that Balandin was among the 11 rowers whose doping tests were manipulated by the Moscow anti-doping laboratory and the Russian deputy minister of sport, as had been outlined in a damning report by Canadian law professor Richard McLaren published last week.
ICF secretary general Simon Toulson said: “This is a bitter blow for the Olympic movement and we are saddened that our sport is implicated”. A fan can never say with 100 percent certainty their favorite athlete is clean and no athlete no matter how clean can convince the outside world beyond a shadow of doubt. Therefore, Austria, Germany, Sweden and Iran are in line to receive their places.
“The World Sailing Board of Directors carefully considered all relevant factors in making these determinations, including the guidance provided by the International Olympic Committee, the results of the McLaren Investigation Report and our own rules and procedures”. Russia’s other six sailors were approve and Russia is able to nominate a replacement for Sozykin, the federation said.
Meanwhile, the International Modern Pentathlon Union named the two Russians it had suspended as Maxim Kustov and Ilya Frolov, saying they were both featured in the McLaren report. A total of 21 Russian gymnasts were entered for the Rio Games.
It seems likely that global sport federations were given advance warning of the IOC decision.
“If the global federations enforce the conditions established by the IOC, and if the IOC takes responsibility for ensuring that they do, then we will have taken an important step in the right direction”.
Triple jumper Ekaterina Koneva – a former world championship silver medalist – told local media she was considering a lawsuit in civil court.
“Others that have been covered up over the past years by the Russian sports authorities, they will compete as supposedly clean athletes”, the pair said in a joint BBC interview.
This is good news if you’re a Russian gymnast as their world governing body is in favor of a case-by-case policy.
Pulling a thread of several confirmed Russian athletes doping tests (of the tens of thousands who annually come from Russia and China), officials have been unable to unravel the machinations of the global doping.
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The IOC refused to accept testing done by Russian agencies because of evidence that the process was corrupted.
