Kenya’s marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir provisionally banned by AIU

Jepchirchir tested affirmative for banned humor booster EPO successful a illustration taken earlier her Sydney Marathon triumph successful August.

Kenya’s satellite marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir has been provisionally suspended aft investigating affirmative for the banned humor booster EPO successful a illustration taken earlier her Sydney Marathon victory, the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) said.

The AIU added that the out-of-competition illustration collected successful Kenya returned an adverse analytical uncovering for EPO (erythropoietin), which boosts the accumulation of reddish humor cells.

Recommended Stories

• list 1 of 4‘My assemblage is inactive peaking’: Kipchoge wins his archetypal marathon successful 3 years
• list 2 of 4Kenya’s Kandie gets seven-year prohibition for doping violations
• list 3 of 4Nairobi to big Africa’s archetypal World Athletics Championships successful 2029
• list 4 of 4Kenya’s Ngetich breaks women-only half-marathon satellite grounds by a second

“I tin lone accidental that I consciousness unspeakable astir what happened and I deliberation it’s lone close that an jock who uses show enhancing drugs should beryllium disqualified,” her cause Gianni Demadonna said successful an emailed statement.

Sydney Marathon organisers said they were “extremely disappointed” to larn astir Jepchirchir’s provisional suspension.

“Jepchirchir is entitled to owed process and we volition marque nary further remark connected the lawsuit until that process has concluded,” organisers said successful a connection connected societal media.

“Our committedness to cleanable athletics is unwavering. Every jock who lines up successful Sydney deserves to contention connected a level playing tract and each subordinate and spectator deserves to spot the effect they spot astatine the decorativeness line.

“That condemnation is why, alongside our chap Abbott World Marathon Majors, we person invested successful accrued out-of-competition investigating successful concern with the AlU, and wherefore we volition support lasting firmly with the athletes who vie cleanly.”

The 33-year-old is simply a erstwhile Olympic champion and half-marathon satellite grounds holder, arsenic good arsenic a four-time World Marathon Majors winner.

She won golden astatine the Tokyo Games successful 2021 and has besides claimed large marathon victories successful New York (2021), Boston (2022), London (2024) and Sydney (2026).

Jepchirchir dominated the women’s contention successful Sydney successful August, pulling wide of the tract to decorativeness successful 2:18:31, much than 3 minutes up of second-placed compatriot Irine Cheptai.

Last year, Kenya’s women’s marathon satellite grounds holder Ruth Chepngetich was banned for 3 years aft admitting anti-doping regularisation violations involving hydrochlorothiazide (HCTZ), a prohibited diuretic, though her satellite grounds of 2:09:56 remained connected the books due to the fact that it was acceptable earlier her affirmative test.