Boston Marathon Winner Stripped of 2014 Title Over Doping Offenses

Kenyan athlete and Boston Marathon winner Rita Jeptoo was dealt a serious blow Wednesday, with news that her two-year suspension has been upped to four, and her 2014 titles are being stripped, including her Boston win.

According to a decision Wednesday from the Court of Arbitration for Sport, "The CAS Panel in charge of the matter has imposed a four-year period of ineligibility on Ms Jeptoo and disqualified the athlete’s results in the 2014 Boston marathon and all other results as from 17 April 2014 (including the 2014 Chicago marathon)."

The decision stems from a 2014 test that found a sample from Jeptoo contained recombinant EPO (rEPO), making her guilty of an anti-doping rule violation and subject to a two-year ineligibility period. Jeptoo filed an appeal in March of 2015, which she later withdrew. The International Association of Athletics Federations subsequently appealed to the CAS, seeking a four-year ineligibility period and requesting that Jeptoo's results in the 2014 Boston marathon be disqualified.

The CAS on Wednesday sided with the IAAF.

The decision came after a months-long period of start-and-stop in the proceedings, as multiple legal representatives agreed to serve as Jeptoo's counsel, then abruptly left, according to the CAS.

In its decision, the CAS writes:

"... the Panel found to its comfortable satisfaction that the athlete used rEPO over a period of time to enhance performance. The undisputed source of the rEPO found in her sample of 25 September 2014 was an injection given to her by a doctor. The athlete provided various differing accounts of the circumstances leading up to the injection and also regarding her relationship with that doctor.

According to the applicable rules, the minimum period of ineligibility in this situation is a sanction of
two years but can be increased to up to four years in the case of aggravating circumstances. The Panel
is comfortably satisfied that there are aggravating circumstances in the case at hand as it was obvious
to the Panel that the athlete used rEPO as part of a scheme or plan. The evidence for this includes inter
alia her long relationship with the doctor in question, her multiple visits to see him, that her rEPO use
was consistent with her competition calendar, that she hid the visits to the doctor in question from her
manager and coach, as well as her deceptive and obstructive conduct throughout the proceedings."

In addition to a four-year ineligibility period, Jeptoo's results in the Boston and Chicago Marathons for 2014 are disqualified. She must additionally forfeit her title, medal, prize money and any appearance money, the CAS said.

Photo by Rob Larsen, Flickr/Creative Commons: Rita Jeptoo runs up Heartbreak Hill in the 2008 Boston Marathon.