Olympic marathon champion Jemima Sumgong fails doping test

Olympic marathon champion Jemima Sumgong tested positive for the blood booster EPO in a surprise out-of-competition doping test in Kenya, the IAAF said Friday, the biggest blow yet to the credibility of the East African country’s famed distance-running program.

Sumgong became the first Kenyan woman to win Olympic gold in the marathon at last year’s Rio de Janeiro Games, is the reigning London Marathon champion, and was the points leader in the World Marathon Majors series. She was in line to receive a $250,000 bonus when the current series ends in Boston on April 17. The series said it won’t name a women’s winner until doping officials have resolved her case.

Sumgong’s test was “part of an enhanced IAAF out-ofcompetition testing program dedicated to elite marathon runners,” the IAAF said.

That program is run jointly by the IAAF and the World Marathon Majors series.

London Marathon organisers announced Sumgong failed the test in February and wouldn’t be allowed to defend her title this month while she was provisionally suspended.

The Olympic champion is now the highest profile of dozens of Kenyan athletes to have failed doping tests since the 2012 London Olympics and her case puts the country’s anti-doping failures back in the spotlight. The vast majority of Kenyan athletes to fail doping tests recently were lower level runners and officials had claimed that the top Olympians were clean.

Sumgong is also the second Kenyan woman to test positive for EPO while leading the world marathon series.

Rita Jeptoo was the top women’s marathon runner in the world when she failed an out-ofcompetition test in Kenya in 2014. Initially given a two-year ban, Jeptoo’s punishment was doubled to four years in 2016 after the IAAF appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport for a sterner sanction.