Skip to main content

Universal Entertainment Increases Anti-Doping Measures as Step to Lifting of Suspension

At a meeting in Osaka the National Corporate Federation's board of directors put on hold the Universal Entertainment women's team's suspension from competing in ekidens organized by the Federation. Universal Entertainment won last November's National Corporate Women's Ekiden, but when one team member was later found to have committed a doping violation the Federation voted in July to strip the team of its title and suspend it from competition.

As one of the conditions for its suspension to be lifted, on Sept. 15 Universal Entertainment submitted to the Federation plans for the steps it would take to prevent a recurrence of the incident. The Federation will investigate the measures and situation at the team next week, and if the anti-doping measures can be confirmed it will fully lift the suspension. If the suspension is lifted the Universal Entertainment team is expected to compete in the Oct. 21 National Corporate Women's Ekiden Qualifier in Fukuoka. If it finishes in the top 14 there it will qualify for the Nov. 25 national race in Miyagi.

Among the measures Universal Entertainment is introducing as part of having its suspension lifted are comprehensive anti-doping education for team staff and athletes, and increasing female staff with whom team members can feel comfortable talking about women's issues. The team member who committed the doping violation received a one year, three month suspension but left the team in March this year.

source article:
https://mainichi.jp/articles/20180922/k00/00m/050/104000c
translated and edited by Brett Larner

Buy Me A Coffee

Comments

Most-Read This Week

Australian YouTuber Handed Lifetime Ban by Ageo City Half Marathon After Running 1:06 with Another Runner's Bib (updated)

After discussion with their race's chief JAAF referee, on Nov. 27 the organizers of the Ageo City Half Marathon handed down a lifetime ban from their event against 36-year-old Australian Matt Inglis Fox  for running the Nov. 15 race wearing the bib number of another JAAF-registered runner. The incident came to light after Fox posted on his personal Instagram account that he had run a PB of 1:06:33 and finished 203rd in Ageo with a 10 km split of 31:03, along with photos and video of himself in the race wearing a bib number beginning with 11. Fox did not appear in the results by name or in that time or place, the closest match being a 1:06:54 gross, 1:06:50 net finish time with a 31:21 10 km split for 18th place in the JAAF-registered division and 209th overall by bib number 1129, registered to a non-Japanese Tokyo-resident club runner. The club runner, Harrisson Uk , readily confirmed that he had given his bib to Fox, saying, "I gave my number to Matt. It wasn't me."...

How it Happened

Ancient History I went to Wesleyan University, where the legend of four-time Boston Marathon champ and Wes alum Bill Rodgers hung heavy over the cross-country team. Inspired by Koichi Morishita and Young-Cho Hwang’s duel at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics I ran my first marathon in 1993, qualifying for Boston ’94 where Bill was kind enough to sign a star-struck 20-year-old me’s bib number at the expo. Three years later I moved to Japan for grad school, and through a long string of coincidences I came across a teenaged kid named Yuki Kawauchi down at my neighborhood track. I never imagined he’d become what he is, but right from the start there was just something different about him. After his 2:08:37 breakthrough at the 2011 Tokyo Marathon he called me up and asked me to help him get into races abroad. He’d finished 3rd on the brutal downhill Sixth Stage at the Hakone Ekiden, and given how he’d run the hills in the last 6 km at Tokyo ’11 I thought he’d do well at Boston or New York. “I...

Nat'l University Ekiden Updates Here

Looks like I just went over my update limit on Twitter - sorry, it's the first time I've tried to use it for this. I'll look for another option next time. In the meantime I'll add updates to the comments below. Not sure if that has a max too but I guess we'll find out. Update: Part one of the Nationals commentary can be found here .