MOSCOW, 20 February 2004 — Natalya Nazarova came within nine hundredths of a second of breaking a 22-year-old world indoor record, clocking 49.68 in the 400 meters at the Russian national championships on Wednesday.
Nazarova, the reigning 400 meters indoor champion, just missed the mark of 49.59 set by the great Czech runner Jarmila Kratochvilova in 1982.
“It’s a real pity to miss it by just this much, but I hope I’ll have another chance at the record pretty soon,” said the 24-year-old Russian. Nazarova, who set a world indoor best over the seldom-run 500 meters last month, will have another shot at Kratochvilova’s mark in final.
Chambers Battles for Olympic Survival
In London, European 100 meters champion Dwain Chambers hoped to be cleared of a charge that he used a performance-enhancing drug banned by the World Anti- Doping Agency when he appeared before a secret disciplinary hearing yesterday.
The 25-year-old Briton was expected to argue that tetrahydrogestrinone (THG) was not on the banned list when he unknowingly took it and the drug is not chemically or pharmacologically related to any banned drug. Chambers, who had hoped to be running for Olympic gold in Athens in August, could be banned for two years if found guilty at the independent UK Athletics hearing.
He twice tested positive for THG last August and has been suspended since November. Four American athletes also tested positive for the drug.
Michael Berloff, a former Court of Arbitration in Sport judge, was defending Chambers. Berloff sat on the CAS panel which ruled at the 1996 Olympics that Russian breaststroke swimmer Andrei Korneev could keep his 200 meters bronze medal because bromantan, the stimulant that Korneyev had taken, was not on the banned list at the time, although it was subsequently added to the list.
Bromantan, developed by the Soviet army to help troops counter fatigue in the war in Afghanistan, is back in the spotlight after Yegor Titov tested positive for it during Russia’s Euro 2004 football play-off against Wales.
WADA has argued that THG is a steroid-related drug.
Don Catlin, the American scientist at the WADA-accredited laboratory in Los Angeles who devised a test for THG, said last year: “Once you see its chemical structure, you know it’s a steroid.” He said THG was similar in structure to gestrinone, an anabolic steroid that is prohibited.
Last week Chambers’ former coach Remi Korchemny was indicted by a federal grand jury in America on charges relating to distributing steroids and growth hormones to athletes.
