Marathon champ banned for eight years

SHANGHAI: China’s national marathon champion and Olympian Wang Jiali has been banned for eight years after failing a drugs test, her second violation, the Chinese Athletics Association (CAA) said on Wednesday.

The 31-year-old, who won gold at the 2017 National Games, tested positive for the banned blood booster EPO during out-of-competition testing in August and her career now appears over. The CAA also fined Wang 40,000 yuan ($6,000) and banned her coach Lyu Qiang for life. Wang — who came 57th in the marathon at the 2012 London Olympics — was banned for two years in 2013 for a previous violation, the state-run Xinhua news agency said.

CHINADA said it conducted a record 17,000 tests last year and vowed to root out drug cheats. “In the past year we improved a lot, including testing methods, test plans and management,” Chen Zhiyu, CHINADA deputy head, was quoted by Xinhua as saying.