Russia facing Rio Olympic, Paralympic ban

TIL Desk Sports/ Russia made a last-ditch bid to avoid a blanket ban at the Rio Games over state-run doping as a fresh batch of drug test failures from Beijing 2008 and London 2012 rocked the Olympics. However, as they launched a desperate rearguard action, the International Paralympic Federation (IPF) announced they were seeking a suspension which would sideline the Russians from the Paralympics in Rio in September.

The IOC’s executive board are to hold a conference call on Sunday to discuss barring Russia from the Olympics starting on August 5 over bombshell doping revelations. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on Thursday rejected an appeal by Russia’s track and field team against their suspension from Rio in a decision seen as a key indicator as the IOC debates whether to kick out the whole Russian team.

Russia is a sporting powerhouse whose absence from Rio would create the biggest crisis in decades for the Olympic movement and President Vladimir Putin launched a final push to avert a ban. “The official position of the Russian authorities — the government, the president and all of us — is that in sport there is not and can be no place for doping,” Putin told government ministers.