One of the 26 Italian athletes facing a two-year ban for missing doping tests had trained with Mo Farah at Alberto Salazar’s Nike Oregon Project.
The Italian Olympic Committee has requested a suspension for Daniele Meucci, the 2010 European Championship 10,000m bronze medal winner, along with 25 others because he has breached World Anti Doping Agency regulations by missing tests more than three times.
Meucci, who also won last year’s marathon at the European Championships in Switzerland, trained in Oregon with Farah and Galen Rupp, who was allegedly given testosterone by Salazar at the age of 16, on a few occasions in the spring of 2012 but the now 30-year-old is understood to have trained mostly on his own. The Italian won a 10,000km race through Central Park, New York on 12 May shortly after his visit to Portland. “‘I’m in very good shape but not in peak shape yet,” he said in an interview after that race.
The Italian athletics federation has offered assistance to all 26 athletes but they will now face trials at the Italian Olympic Committee’s anti-doping court next year.
There are no allegations of any wrongdoing on Farah’s part. Salazar remains under investigation by the United States Anti-Doping Agency due to the allegations made in a BBC Panorama documentary aired in June. The coach denies any wrongdoing.
