Russian Federation has already suffered the indignity of its entire track and field team being banned over unconfirmed reports that some athletes took part in a second state-sponsored doping scheme.
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The IOC will not be allowed to deny the Russian Olympic Committee to select contestants for the Olympic Games in Rio exclusively because they have previously received a doping sanction. “On top of all that, Russian athletes are going through additional testing which is taking place at the Olympic Village”.
“A tough talk was held with the team and instructions were issued about not talking to the Russian media (in Rio)”, Zhdanov wrote on his Facebook page.
Isinbayeva won Olympic gold in the women’s pole vault at London 2012 while Shubenkov is the world 110m hurdles champion.
International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach revealed that a figure of how many Russian athletes have been cleared to compete in the Rio Games will be announced later on Thursday.
In the very near future, maybe even shortly after the official opening of the Games, the Russian team may be joined by a few more athletes.
The runner helped expose state-backed doping in Russian sport and has fled the country, now living at a secret location in the United States. We asked the IOC humbly that Yuliya, as she would never be nominated by the Russian Olympic Committee, be permitted to compete as a neutral athlete at the Games in Rio.
But the ROC says another five cases are still pending – three track cyclists, one wrestler and one canoeist.
The four-times world champion was handed a lifeline on Thursday when the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) upheld her appeal against her ban from the Games, whose preparations have been overshadowed by revelations of widespread state-sponsored doping in Russian Federation.
The IOC took a soft line and on Sunday ordered individual sports federations to decide whether Russian competitors could take part in the games.
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He said at a media conference: “We have informed the global federations and now we need to inform first the worldwide federations of the athletes and the NOC concerned before we can publish the final results”. At the same time, it advised the relevant global federations to ban those athletes that had earlier been disqualified for doping, as well as those mentioned in McLaren’s report.
