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Russians lose track appeal; International Olympic Committee to weigh total ban for Rio

The report has Prompted the International Olympic Committee to consider banning Russian Federation from the Rio Games altogether.

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The issue has garnered much opinion and Australian Olympic great Andrew Gaze is hoping innocent Russians won’t be kicked out of the Rio Games.

The CAS ruling backed up a decision from athletics governing body the IAAF to slap a blanket ban on Russia’s track and field team ahead of the Olympics over evidence of state-sponsored doping. “It’s a landmark statement that allows us to move forward and be inspired by pictures we’ll see at the Games”, Campbell, who was part of Britain’s gold medal-winning 4x100m relay team at the Athens Games, told the British media.

Yelena Isinbayeva, Russia’s two-time Olympic pole vault champion, also called on the IOC to have the final say after labeling the verdict as “purely political”.

Russian Federation lost its appeal today against the Olympic ban on its track and field athletes, a decision that could add pressure on the IOC to exclude the country entirely from next month’s games in Rio de Janeiro.

“This (ban on track and field athletes) will scare a lot of people or send a strong message that the sport is serious; we want a clean sport”. She will now miss the Olympics because of her new nation’s ban.

“I am anxious and deeply upset by the possibility that in the case of a ban on Russian athletes competing in the Olympics, the innocent will be punished along with the guilty”, he wrote in the letter, published on his website.

Earlier this week, a second major World Anti-Doping Agency-funded investigation revealed that Russia’s doping was run by the Ministry of Sport, facilitated by the secret service and anti-doping set-up and encompassed nearly every Olympic and Paralympic discipline.

“Thank you everyone for the funeral of athletics”, she said.

But the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) has ruled it can stand.

The IOC said it would “study and analyze the full decision” and make its own final ruling on the participation of Russian athletes “in the coming days”.

The IAAF has said Russian athletes who prove they were not tainted by their country’s corrupt system could be cleared for the Games.

The Swiss-based body rejected an appeal against the hard-line IAAF stance by the Russian Olympic Committee and 68 individual athletes.

With the Olympics just two weeks away, that list will inevitably be short, but CAS judges ruled that any Russian track and field competitor who meets the IAAF criteria can compete in Brazil.

It was maintained in June after the IAAF Council ruled that not enough progress had been made in transforming Russia’s anti-doping programme. But several are already at risk because of doping failures.

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Coe said that after the Rio Games, an IAAF task force “will continue to work with Russia to establish a clean safe environment for its athletes so that its federation and team can return to global recognition and competition”.

Secretary General of the Court of Arbitration for Sport Matthieu Reeb gestures after delivering a statement