Athletics: Krabbe banned for further two years
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Your support makes all the difference.KATRIN KRABBE, the 1991 world 100 and 200 metres champion, has been banned for two more years from today for 'unsportsmanlike conduct,' writes Adam Szreter.
Krabbe, along with her former East German team-mates Grit Breuer and Manuela Derr, were originally banned for four years after failing an out-of-competition drug test last year.
In contradiction of International Amateur Athletic Federation sanctions, the German federation, DLV, reduced the suspension to one year, saying it had no provisions for out-of- competition testing in its own rules and that German courts would not accept a four-year ban.
In May, the IAAF Council said Krabbe would remain suspended until it decided whether the case needed to go to arbitration. The German federation has been pushing the IAAF Council to make a final decision or take the case to arbitration.
To avoid arbitration the council decided to suspend Krabbe for two years for bringing the sport into disrepute, but not on drugs charges. It is believed that no arbitration can be called in cases of athletes suspended.
An official statement is to be made today, along with an announcement over the future of John Ngugi, five times the world cross country champion and the 1988 Olympic 5,000m champion, who could be banned for four years for refusing a drugs test.
The Kenyan would not let IAAF drugs officials into his house when they made a random call, but appealed against a ban, arguing the officials had not properly revealed who they were.
Three positive doping cases have been announced at the World Championships. The latest involved the Olympic discus champion, Romas Ubartas of Lithuania, who finished fourth. The IAAF said he tested positive for the anabolic steroid Boldenone, and faces a four-year ban.
Primo Nebiolo, the IAAF president, said last night: 'We don't want the championships to finish with talk about drugs. Doping is a very serious problem. Our federation has decided to fight against this problem in the most serious manner. That is why we decided to maintain the four-year suspension.'
Earlier in the day Nebiolo had presented Butch Reynolds with his gold medal as a member of the United States 4 x 400m relay quartet. Reynolds had been banned for two years by the IAAF, a decision which he fought against until winning a dollars 27m ( pounds 18m) award from a US court last year. However, yesterday the two men seemed to have settled their differences, Reynolds saying: 'I was speechless and very touched. As far as I'm concerned the personal feud is over.'
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