Running

4/22/2024 |  Ethiopian distance runner and Olympic finalist Zerfe Wondemagegn banned 5 years for doping (Associated Press (AP)) MONACO (AP) — A runner from Ethiopia who reached the 3,000-meter steeplechase final at the Tokyo Olympics, and narrowly missed the world championship podium last year, has been banned for five years after testing positive for two banned substances.

4/19/2024 |  Beijing Half Marathon champion has medal taken away after other runners slowed down to let him win (Associated Press (AP)) BANGKOK (AP) — Organizers have revoked He Jie’s first place in the Beijing Half Marathon last weekend after an investigation confirmed that three other runners had slowed down to let him win the race.
All four runners were disqualified and had to return their medals and award money.
Chinese online users had shared the video from the final moment s of Sunday’s race out of suspicion that it had been rigged. The footage showed three African runners letting He, China’s top long-distance runner, move ahead of them shortly before they were about to reach the finish line. 

4/19/2024 |  Olympic sports bodies criticize track and field’s move to pay $50,000 for Paris gold medalists (Associated Press (AP)) GENEVA (AP) — Olympic sports bodies criticized World Athletics on Friday for promising to pay $50,000 for each track and field gold medal won at the Paris Olympics.
Last week’s move by the track body and its president Sebastian Coe broke with tradition because the International Olympic Committee does not pay prize money, though many state governments and national Olympic bodies do.

4/15/2024 |  Bahraini marathon runner Kimutai suspended three years for doping (Associated Press (AP)) MONACO (AP) — Bahraini marathon runner Marius Kimutai was suspended three years for doping after testing positive for the banned substance EPO, the Athletics Integrity Unit said on Monday.
Kimutai won the Barcelona Marathon last year.
The Athletics Integrity Unit said in a statement that the 31-year-old road runner did not have a therapeutic use exemption for the EPO found in blood and urine samples he provided during out-of-competition testing on Feb. 2 in Kenya. 

4/15/2024 |  The field is off for the 128th Boston Marathon. But first, a celebration of a century in Hopkinton (Associated Press (AP)) BOSTON (AP) — The otherwise sleepy New England town of Hopkinton celebrated its 100th anniversary as the starting line for the Boston Marathon on Monday, sending off a field of 17 former champions and nearly 30,000 other runners on its way. Near the finish on Boylston Street, officials observed the anniversary of the 2013 bombing that killed three and wounded hundreds more.