On Friday, the legendary distance runner Haile Gebrselassie advised world leaders in athletics not to be bogged down by the unprecedented doping crisis that has hit the sport but to seize the opportunity and clean up the sport to the hilt.
Ethiopian Gebrselassie also asserted that athletics will come out stronger from the controversy that emerged from the Russian doping scandal.
The 43-year-old Gebrselassie, who won a gold medal each in the 1996 Atlanta and 2000 Sydney Olympic Games , said that the unearthing of widespread doping in Russia is bad as well as good from two different aspects. It’s bad because people are shocked by the news of this scandal. It’s good in the sense that we have a chance to clean up the sport.
He added that even in his country Ethiopia, strong laws have been passed with tough punishment like sending offenders to prison and making doping a criminal offence.
Talking further about the state of world athletics, he said that the IAAF is looking at new ideas and coming up with new competitions for more spectators to come out and watch and that will make athletics grow further.”
