International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach admitted Wednesday the Russian doping scandal is “sad and shocking” but insisted IAAF chief Sebastian Coe is the man to clean up track and field.
Russian athletes face being blacklisted from international competition after a World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) report highlighted “state sponsored doping”.
“What the report shows is sad and shocking,” said Bach, pointing to allegations that some officials demanded vast sums of money to hush up positive dope tests.
“I would never have imagined that in an international federation, money would be solicited from athletes to manipulate results.”
The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) will meet in Monaco on Friday where they could follow the WADA recommendations and slap a worldwide ban Russian athletes.
Bach said recently-appointed IAAF president Coe was the right man to clean up the sport with less than a year to go to the 2016 Olympics in Rio.
“I have confidence in Sebastian Coe and his team to implement all that is necessary to clean up the federation and the IAAF is going to announce its decisions on Friday.
“Medals could be taken back and redistributed, athletes and officials will be sanctioned and excluded by the IAAF,” added the German when quizzed on the range of sanctions available.
“All athletes who were not eligible for the Olympics in London or for other Games for violating the anti-doping code will be disqualified and their medals withdrawn and reallocated.”