Reigning Boston and Chicago Marathon champion Rita Jeptoo fails drugs test

It was announced yesterday that one of the top Kenyan marathon runners Rita Jeptoo had failed a doping test. In a statement, Athletics Kenya said..."The result of the 'A' sample for the athlete has indicated the presence of prohibited substances."

33 year old Jeptoo won the Boston Marathon last April in a course record time of 2:18:57 and also won the Chicago Marathon in October in 2:24:35. She has previously won the  Boston and Chicago marathons and also  won marathons in Stockholm, Paris, Milan and Lisbon.

She was due this weekend to be awarded $500,000 for winning the yearlong World Marathon Major Series. In a statement, the organisers of that award said......."World Marathon Majors is disappointed to learn that Rita Jeptoo has apparently had an A test that proved positive for a banned substance under IAAF rules. World Marathon Majors has been at the forefront of the fight against doping in our sport and has a rule that no athlete can win the World Marathon Majors Series title, who has been in breach of IAAF anti-doping rules. WMM events were the first major events to confirm that all elite athletes taking part in their events would be blood tested and have consistently called for wider testing by others. Additionally, WWM has previously agreed that any athlete found guilty of a doping offense will not be invited back to its races. As part of that fight against doping, WMM has been giving support and financial help to the IAAF anti doping drive and helped fund a wider programme of out of competition testing…At present there has been no decision in this case by the IAAF, including in relation to sanctions, and as a result WMM is unable to comment further until that determination has been made although in the circumstances it has been decided to postpone the WMM Awards Ceremony that was due to take place on November 2, 2014."

All this of course puts the spotlight on countres like Kenya and the level of drug testing they do on their national athletes. In 2013, former top Kenyan athlete Moses Kiptanui claimed that doping was rife amongst Kenyan athletes. In total, 36 Kenyans have been confirmed as failing tests in the past two years.