Athletics: Lewis-Francis loses medal for positive test

Mark Lewis-Francis has been stripped of his European indoor 60m silver medal and given a public warning by UK Athletics after testing positive for cannabis.

Mark Lewis-Francis has been stripped of his European indoor 60m silver medal and given a public warning by UK Athletics after testing positive for cannabis.

The 22-year-old Olympic relay gold medallist showed traces of the banned substance in a sample taken during the European Indoor Championships on 5 March, when he finished behind fellow Briton Jason Gardener. Lewis-Francis has received the most favourable treatment possible within World Anti-Doping Agency rules, which allow for up to one year's suspension for a first offence involving what is classified as a "specified substance" along with others such as alcohol and beta-blockers. They also specify disqualification from any competition in which a positive test occurs.

A spokesman for UK Sport said that there had been five cases of sportsmen testing positive for cannabis in the year ending on 31 March. Rugby union player Pierre Durant was suspended for six weeks; basketball player John Simpson was banned for three months, as was rugby league player Wirihana Raihania, and boxer Eugene Heagney received a six-month ban from the Amateur Boxing Association. But triple jumper Jonathan Moore received only a public warning.

Dave Collins, the performance director for UK Athletics, said Lewis-Francis had received "exactly the punishment he should receive", describing it as "an open and shut case" and adding that there was "certainly no performance-enhancing effect in cannabis".

That is not true as far as certain sports requiring calmness, such as shooting or snooker, are concerned. But in Lewis-Francis' case, cannabis would have been the exact opposite of performance-enhancing for the 60m event.

Silver now goes to France's European indoor record holder, Ronald Pognon, with Ukraine's Kostyantyn Vasyukov taking bronze.

Lewis-Francis said: "My only explanation is I may have been in the presence of people who were smoking cannabis."

His plea is immaterial, however, as the doping rules operate on the principle of strict liability: if a substance is in an athlete's system, they are responsible, no matter how it got there.

While Lewis-Francis's own infringement may not have been performance-enhancing, it infringed the other two principles which determine whether a substance is added to the banned list which relates to "risks to health" and "violation of the spirit of sport".

Collins added: "This highlights the importance of athletes considering all aspects of their lifestyle, including people they are involved with. Mark has worked very hard over the winter, and I'm sure he will be very fed up to have lost the medal he gained through all that effort. But I'm sure this will be a lesson to him."

It will certainly need to be, as the sanction for any repeat offence is an automatic two-year ban.

Lewis-Francis clocked a promising time of 10.13sec in his opening 100m of the season last weekend at a meeting in Jamaica, where he was watched by his father Sean. The Briton was fifth, behind home winner Asafa Powell, who set a national record of 9.84sec.

The European Indoor Championships appear jinxed for Lewis-Francis. After winning the 60m silver in Vienna three years ago, he was jailed overnight on his return for driving with a provisional licence.