The Electronic Telegraph Thursday 2 August 2001 Tom Knight PAULA RADCLIFFE and Kelly Holmes were in angry mood yesterday as they prepared for the World Championships, which start here tomorrow. For the usually mild-mannered Radcliffe the target was the drug-takers while her British team-mate launched an astonishing attack on an opponent she admitted she knew nothing about. Radcliffe, who over recent years has led virtually a one-woman campaign against doping, has been outraged to discover she is being forced to share the competitors' village dining room with Olga Yegorova, the Russian runner who last week became the first athlete to test positive for the blood-boosting drug erythropoietin (EPO). Yegorova, whose blood and urine tested positive after the recent Golden League meeting in Paris, has come to Edmonton to plead her case before the International Amateur Athletic Federation and is still entered for the 5,000 metres. The IAAF, whose credibility is at stake on the eve of their own championships, are waiting to see if the positive result is confirmed by analysis of the athlete's B blood test. Radcliffe's blood, meanwhile, has been boiling at the sight of Yegorova queuing up for her breakfast. Radcliffe said: "It's a shame she is in the village. I don't think we should have to see her in the dining room. "For her to be here, thinking she is still going to race in the championships, is wrong. "Women in the 5,000m might have to race against her in a heat. She is here to appeal and that's wrong because she is not disputing she failed a test. The EPO test is watertight. That's why it took so long to be established." Radcliffe said she would like to say something to Yegorova but admits the presence of her Russian minders has put her off. What would she say? "I'd say, 'go home'," Radcliffe said. "It's not worth getting involved though. I'm here to run at a World Championships and once the competition starts, I have to concentrate on that. "I now accept that the sport will not be totally clean in my competitive lifetime. But the fact that people are being caught is a positive step. "This is not just a problem now. It's been happening for years. We now have to make sure the tests are improved and that there are spot tests carried out during the winter." If nothing else, however, Yegorova's positive result goes some way to vindicating Radcliffe's anti-doping stance. "It was beginning to get a bit silly," Radcliffe said. 'The most difficult part was trying not to make it sound like sour grapes on my part." Holmes, meanwhile, claimed Brazilian Fabiane dos Santos, whose breakthrough this season has caught everyone by surprise, runs the risk of disqualification from the 800m. So far this summer dos Santos, 25, has come close to beating Maria Mutola, the Olympic champion, and, in her last race at Crystal Palace, won the British Grand Prix ahead of Stephanie Graf, the Olympic silver medallist. >From 75th in the world last year, the native Amazonian who was adopted at three and brought up in Sao Paulo, goes into the World Championships ranked second with the 1min 57.16sec she clocked behind Mutola in Monaco. Holmes, who won bronze in Sydney, was third at Crystal Palace and unhappy with the Brazilian's tactics. She said: "I don't know how she didn't get thrown out. She's a rough runner. If you look at her races, she's barged across a lot of people and cut people off. "Yes, you're going to have the trips and bangs and things but when you're blatantly getting in someone's way or stopping somebody from performing, then in a championship it will be slightly different. "I don't know where she's from and maybe it shows her inexperience of running at this level. She has a good chance of getting disqualified." Karl Keska, the 5,000 and 10,000 metres runner, has pulled out of the British team for Edmonton after failing to recover from a virus. The 29-year-old picked up the virus after a meeting last month when he ran just inside the qualifying time for the 5,000m. Eamonn Condon www.RunnersGoal.com
