March 25--A key figure in the Russian doping scandal has been handed a lifetime ban for his part in what authorities have characterized as a systemic effort to cheat.
Race walking coach Viktor Chegin had built a powerhouse team whose members won medals at each of the previous three Olympic Games. But several of his athletes have recently failed drug tests.
News of Chegin's punishment, reported Friday by the Associated Press, comes a day after the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that Russian race walkers Sergey Kirdyapkin and Olga Kaniskina should be stripped of their medals from the 2012 Summer Games.
The court similarly ruled that four other Russian athletes should face more severe penalties than originally imposed by the country's anti-doping agency.
The entire Russian track and field program remains banned from international competition with the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics less than six months away.
