Pauls blasts rule change that KO’s pre-2005 records
PAULA RADCLIFFE has angrily attacked plans to rewrite world records in athletics as disrespectful and an insult to the dignity of clean athletes.
Under proposals put forward by European Athletics, all marks set before 2005 would be wiped from the books, regardless of the athlete involved, in a bid to eliminate any doping doubts surrounding past performances.
The proposals would need the approval of world governing body the IAAF to come into force, but president Lord Coe has already given his initial backing to the idea.
World marathon record holder Radcliffe, 43, whose mark of two hours 15 minutes 25 seconds, set in 2003, would be wiped out under the plans, said: “Even though they will always stand as our personal bests, it’s very hard to be told, ‘We don’t value your record, we don’t believe and respect it and we can’t trust it’.
“They’re telling us, ‘We’re going to do it with your dignity intact,’ but it doesn’t feel like that and it doesn’t feel like athletics is yet at that situation where we can fully guarantee everybody who tries to cheat out there is getting caught – I don’t think we can be at that point yet.
“We worked hard for those records, we feel that they’re a reflection of us, a reflection of the hard work and the integrity and the work of the whole team around us put in to those performances and being proud of those performances because they’re clean performances.”
Under the new standards, a world record would only be recognised if it met three key criteria: it was achieved at a competition on a list of approved international events where the highest standards of officiating and technical equipment can be guaranteed; the athlete had been subject to an agreed number of doping control tests in the months leading up to it; and the doping control sample taken after the record was stored and available for re-testing for 10 years.
Current records not meeting the criteria would remain on the all-time list, but no longer be officially recognised as records. Crucially, the IAAF has only stored blood and urine samples since 2005.
Jonathan Edwards’ triple jump world record of 18.29 metres – set in 1995 – is, therefore, also in danger of being erased.
He said: “I thought my record would go some day, just not to a bunch of sports administrators. It seems wrong-headed.”
Colin Jackson, who has held the 60m hurdles world record of 7.30secs since 1994, branded the proposals “ridiculous” and said they would “rob memories” from fans.
“All athletes set out to achieve in our sport. When we achieve medals it’s fantastic, that’s our objective,” he said.
“When you break records that’s really the icing on the cake, so for somebody to just say that actually we’re not so sure whether your performance was done in a legal fashion so we don’t want to have your record any more, but you can keep all your medals because we presume you won those medals cleanly, it’s quite ridiculous in my mind.”
Steve Cram, the European record holder for the mile, labelled the new idea “an easy cop-out” and said they were “not going to stop anyone cheating”.
“They haven’t been prepared to make tough decisions,” he said. “If there are records that they believe shouldn’t be on the books then they should go after those individual performances and records with whatever scrutiny they can. If they can’t do that then that’s their problem to deal with.”