Kenyan road runner Betty Wilson Lempus has been banned for five years from competing after being found to have twice violated World Athletics anti-doping rules.
Lempus, 31, is best-known for smashing the Paris women’s half-marathon record on 5 September 2021 – the date that a sample she gave tested positive for the banned metabolite Triamcinolone Acetonide.
She then falsified medical documents to explain the presence of the metabolite, the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) found in a report.
She has been disqualified from the Paris half-marathon and all races since, the AIU said.
The punishment is two years for the doping violation and four for the attempt to cover it up, but a year was subtracted from the ban owing to Lempus’ admitting to doing both.
Lempus had claimed that she had been injected with Triamcinolone Acetonide at a Kenyan hospital some 16 days before the Paris race. But in June 2022 the Medical Superintendent from the hospital in question stated that though Lempus had been present that day, she had not received “an intramuscular injection of Triamcinolone Acetonide at the hospital on this date”.
“The official also cited other discrepancies, including false hospital documents (including address and phone number) and that the doctor, whom Lempus claimed attended to her, is not employed at the hospital,” the AIU report stated.
“Confronted by the AIU with this evidence in October 2022, Lempus admitted to Tampering.”
The Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya worked alongside the AIU to conclude the case, which has once again highlighted the issue of performance-enhancing drugs being used by some of the country’s elite athletes.
“We are pleased to conclude this case, especially because this athlete almost got away with her attempt to dupe the authorities and to cheat other runners out of their rightful rewards,” said AIU Head Brett Clothier.
“This is the right and fair outcome, and it’s a signal to all that the AIU takes its mission extremely seriously and will pursue every angle in seeking to reach the truth.”
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