(Reuters) – World Triathlon has imposed sanctions on the Russian Triathlon Federation (RTF) that will be effective for one year due to a “significant number” of doping cases in the country, the governing body said in a statement on Monday.
As part of the sanctions, Russia will not be able to organise any World or European Triathlon events until the end of 2022, and RTF officials will have to resign from the events’ governing bodies for the period of one year.
RTF has also been asked to reach an agreement with the Russia Anti-Doping Agency to test all athletes from the country, as well as refund cash prizes previously awarded to the Russian triathletes penalised with doping offences.
Earlier this year, Russian triathlete Igor Polyanskiy became the first athlete to be formally disqualified from the Tokyo Olympics after he was suspended for three years after testing positive for the banned substance EPO.
(Reporting by Dhruv Munjal in Bengaluru; Editing by Christian Radnedge)
