2012 Boston Marathon medallist receives 4-year doping ban

Yet another Kenyan runner has been busted for an anti-doping violation, as the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya issued Georgina Rono a four-year ban from competition on Tuesday. Although she didn’t test positive for any banned substances, Rono still violated anti-doping rules, as she reportedly evaded a drug test. Rono finished third at the 2012 Boston Marathon, and although she has not competed since 2021, her ban only adds to the growing list of Kenyan athletes implicated in doping scandals. Rono will not be able to race again until January 2027.

ADAK has banned Georgina Rono for 4 years after she failed to provide blood and urine samples and disappeared into a maize farm. #DeadlineDay pic.twitter.com/NXAhTK7rjM

— Home of Champions (@ItenDaily) January 31, 2023

Rono’s career 

The highlight of Rono’s career is undoubtedly her podium performance in Boston in 2012, but a close second would have to be her win at the Hamburg Marathon in 2014. She owns a 2:21:39 personal best from the 2012 Frankfurt Marathon, where she finished second, and she also grabbed a second-place finish at the Ras Al Khaimah (RAK) International Half Marathon that year. Rono has not competed since 2021, when she raced the Eldoret City Marathon in Kenya, although she registered a DNF. Her last recorded finish in a race came over three years ago at the 2019 Standard Chartered Nairobi Marathon, where she finished fifth. 

Kenya’s doping problem 

While Kenya has been one of the most successful countries when it comes to athletics at the Olympic Games (Kenyans have won 66 Olympic medals on the track and road since the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney), it is also one of the countries with the worst and most troubling track records when it comes to doping. There are currently more than 50 Kenyan athletes on the Athletics Integrity Unit’s list of Global List of Ineligible Persons. 

Another boost for Kenyan athletes as @wada_ama clears Kenya from potential athletics doping ban.
 
It's time to raise Kenya's flag high by showing the world we are capable of breaking records while staying true to ourselves.
 
 #Save your health & your career,avoid #doping. pic.twitter.com/foHiNANpFG

— National Youth Council Kenya (@NYC_YouthVoice) December 1, 2022

“Over the course of one year, 40 per cent of all the [positive drug tests] recorded in global athletics are in Kenya,” World Athletics (WA) president Seb Coe said following a 2022 WA council meeting. Coe added that WA has been eyeing the ever-growing doping issues in Kenya for some time, and he and his team seriously considered issuing an outright ban of all Kenyan athletes until the problem was sorted. 

Fortunately for the clean Kenyan athletes (and the many athletics fans who love watching them compete), Coe and WA did not ban them after the Kenyan government committed to dedicating $5 million a year over the next five years to improve the country’s anti-doping program.