Israeli record-breaker suspended by anti-doping committee

Israeli sprinter Olga Lenskiy has been suspended until the end of the year and had her 100-meter record rescinded by the Anti-Doping Committee of Israel.

Lenskiy broke Esther Roth-Shachamarov’s 42-year-old record – which she claimed at the 1072 Munich Olympics – in April, clocking a time of 11.42 seconds at Hadar Yosef Stadium in Tel Aviv, improving the previous best by three hundredths of a second.

However, the new record was cast in doubt three days later when the Israel Athletics Association announced the 22-year-old failed to show up for a drugs test the morning after, saying she wasn’t able to attend as she had to fly to Ukraine to visit her ill grandmother.

Lenskiy returned three weeks saying she had suffered a nervous breakdown and urinary infection in a hospital in Lviv, however, the Anti-Doping Committee’s three-man disciplinary panel didn’t accept her explanation. Lenskiy said she was on her way to take a test on the day of the race when she was notified that it was cancelled, and told the committee: “After I went online in Ukraine and read all the articles written about me I told my mother that I don’t want to live anymore and don’t want to return to Israel.

“I cried all night and felt like I was being made to look like a criminal. The following morning I didn’t feel well and was hospitalized. I was released from hospital on May 7 and returned almost immediately. I have never taken any banned substance before a competition.”