Radcliffe threatens to sue over records

PAULA RADCLIFFE may launch a legal challenge to athletics’ world governing body if the IAAF back a proposal to erase all world records set before 2005. That was the year when athletes’ blood and urine samples were first stored as an anti-doping measure. The women’s marathon world record-holder told Sportsmail last night that she had spoken to Jonathan Edwards and other athletes potentially affected by the proposal from European Athletics and said they would fight to protect their status as world record-holders. Asked if that could include going to court, Radcliffe said: ‘You would hope it doesn’t come to that. You would hope the governing bodies start to listen to us and actually do their job, which is to protect clean athletes. ‘I’ve spoken to Jonathan and, while it is not in our nature to cause trouble, we may have to look at all the options. We had to compete against people who were

cheating, and — as now — when the amount of funding for drug testing is insufficient. We are paying the price for people who have chosen to cheat. At some point you have to say: “No, I am not going to take this”. ‘This time it feels like we have just been chucked in the bin. And for what? An idea that I just feel hasn’t been thought through. ‘If you could guarantee that, from this point on, nobody would be able to cheat, there could be an argument for this. ‘But if, three years down the line, another athlete is caught, the credibility of the sport is destroyed again.’ The International Association of Athletics Federations began storing blood and urine samples in 2005 and current records that do not meet the new criteria would remain on an ‘all-time list’, but not be recognised as records. Radcliffe, whose world marathon record of 2hr 15min 25sec was set in 2003, made the point that erasing some records could actually see them passed to Russian athletes now suspected of benefiting from a national doping programme. She also suggested Edwards ‘would have been subjected to more stringent out-ofcompetition testing in 1995 than athletes from some countries have been in recent years’. Edwards is similarly angry. ‘I thought my record would go some day, just not to a bunch of sports administrators,’ the triple jump world record-holder told The Guardian. Colin Jackson, who has held the 60m hurdles indoor world record since 1994, branded the proposals ‘ridiculous’. ‘What they’re saying is they don’t trust the performances of the majority of people before 2005,’ said Jackson. ‘It’s really quite offensive when I’ve put so much time and effort into my career. You can never erase history.’ European Athletics taskforce chief Pierce O’Callaghan said action had to be taken. ‘We’ve all watched things in athletics in horror over recent years,’ said O’Callaghan. ‘But now is crunch time for the future. ‘Athletes won’t have to chase totally unrealistic records, the public will appreciate more what they see. This is absolutely not casting aspersions on British athletes’ records.’ O’Callaghan said Lord Coe (above), president of the IAAF, fully supports the proposals. ‘Seb gives it his full backing,’ he said. ‘He’s going to lose two records — his European 1,000m record and Britain’s 4x800m European record, where he ran the last leg. ‘But he sees the bigger picture of sport being bigger than the individual and people have to accept that. Assuming the IAAF back it, then it could happen as early as the end of this year.’