When Ruth Chepngetich annihilated the women’s marathon world record in Chicago two years ago today, NBC’s commentators compared it to the moon landing. Afterwards she was asked by Robert Johnson of Let’s Run what her response was to those who believed she must be doping. Because five months after that epic run, Chepngetich’s star came crashing down to earth.
First she failed a doping test. Then she was banned for three years. These days people in the sport talk about her reluctantly, like a family member who has joined a mysterious cult.
Yet her world record still stands because she passed a test after the race itself. What should we think of this? What are we allowed legally to say about this?
And what, if anything, can be done about it? A couple of weeks ago, I spoke to Brett Clothier, the head of the Athletics Integrity Unit, which prosecuted the case against Chepngetich, to ask about her world record. But while legally Chepngetich was clean when she broke her world record, the fact it stands surely damages the sport’s credibility.
True, there are plenty of highly suspicious records from the 80s and early 90s, given what we know about state-sponsored doping behind the iron curtain and in China. And if you believe Florence Griffith Joyner knocked more than half a second off her 100m and 200m times in 1988 by doing 5,000 sit-ups a day and drinking water, I have some magic beans to sell you. Griffith Joyner, of course, never tested positive.
But before her death aged 38, her fellow American sprinter Darrell Robinson claimed in a paid interview with the German magazine Stern that he had sold her human growth hormone for $2,000. He also alleged that she had told him: “If you want to make a million dollars, you’ve got to invest a couple of thousand.” Yet as much as Flo-Jo’s records make us uneasy, they are seen as coming from a bygone and more lawless era. Also, what makes Chepngetich unique is that no other athlete has been hit with a lengthy ban so soon after a world record.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
