From Inside the Games
Russia’s Tatyana Andrianova will be allowed to keep the bronze medal she won in the 800 metres at the 2005 International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) World Championships, even though she tested positive for banned performance-enhancing drugs when her sample from the event was re-analysed, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled today.
CAS issued the judgement because the decision to disqualify Andrianova was taken in 2015, 10 years after the event when the rules at the time meant the statute of limitations was eight.
She has also had a two-year ban lifted, although at the age of 36 it is believed she has retired.
The IAAF had announced last December she had tested positive for banned anabolic steroid stanozolol from a sample taken at the event.
All of her results from August 9, 2005, the date of the positive drugs test, until August 8, 2007, had been annulled and she was banned from September 22, 2015 to September 21, 2017.
CAS has now ruled that the IAAF and All-Russian Athletics Federation (ARAF) did not have the power to take any of these actions.
“The Sole Arbitrator found that the IAAF Anti-Doping Rules (ADR) in force between 9 August 2005 and 31 December 2014 required the ARAF to bring any anti-doping rule violation charges against the Athlete within 8 years from the date of the sample collection (i.e. 9 August 2005),” CAS said in a statement.
“However, the Sole Arbitrator found that ARAF erroneously opened disciplinary proceedings against the Athlete in August 2015 – more than 8 years after her sample collection – and that for this reason the appeal had to be upheld and the ARAF ADC decision annulled.
“As the 8-year statute of limitations had expired prior to 1 January 2015, the 10-year statute of limitations provided under the new 2015 ADR cannot apply.”
It means that Mozambique’s Maria Mutola, who finished fourth in the race won by Cuba’s Zulia Calatayud ahead of Morocco’s Hasna Benhassi, will not be awarded the bronze medal.
It would have been the sixth World Championships medal of her career, having won gold in 1993, 2001 and 2003, silver in 1999 and bronze in 1997.
