T. NashipaeKenyan marathoner Kunyuga banned for eight years
Reading Time: 3min | Sat. 04.11.23. | 11:17
The 36-year-old tested positive at the 2022 Riga Marathon in Latvia, where he finished second
The Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) has handed Kenyan marathon runner Michael Njenga Kunyuga an eight-year ban for the use of the prohibited substance Nandrolone as well as tampering.
Njenga was punished for lying to anti-doping officials following his provisional suspension in August this year.
The 36-year-old tested positive at the 2022 Riga Marathon in Latvia, where he finished second.
He tested positive for nandrolone (19-nortestosterone). Nandrolone is a prohibited substance under the WADA 2022 Prohibited List. It is a non-specified substance prohibited at all times.
Subsequently, AIU began digging into the case. Kunyuga had the option of accepting his mistake and benefiting from a reduced suspension by a year, but he refuted all the claims.
The long-distance runner explained that in 2021, he experienced knee and back pain, and he took painkillers to ease the pain. He noted that the painkillers started having an effect on his stomach, and he started taking them.
A year later, in January 2022, Kunyuga pointed out that the pain greatly impacted his training load, and he was advised to seek alternative medication.
He says he proceeded to the Nyahururu County Referral Hospital, where he was given injections of Depomedrol every three months.
He even provided medical documents dated January 18, 2022. The documents sent to a laboratory from the Nyahururu Referral Hospital confirmed that he had been diagnosed with osteoarthritis and that he was to be treated by an intramuscular injection of depomedrol (methylprednisolone) and vitamin B complex.
His feedback was unsatisfying, and on September 1, 2022, the AIU wrote to Kunyuga, noting that his explanation and the ingestion of depomedrol and vitamin B complex did not explain the presence of the banned substance.
Kunyuga further explained that he had been in Iten on April 18, 2022, and had sought medicine for his knee pain there.
The athlete alleged that he had attended the Iten County Referral Hospital on that date, where 'they looked for an alternative medication' based on his description of his knee pain.
He also said that he had been injected with a medicine identified on a prescription form that he presented.
The case got a little complicated, and on September 9, 2022, the AIU sought the aid of the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya (ADAK) to determine the accuracy of Kunyuga's asserted medical treatment in Nyahururu and the authenticity of the Nyahururu documents.
A probe was launched, and it came out that the county's referral hospital's central records department had no trace of Kunyuga.
He did not visit the hospital in January 2022, and the documents did not originate from Nyahururu County Referral Hospital as claimed.
The AIU representatives then tried to reach out to Kunyuga online, but the connection was lost. They did not manage to reach him despite several attempts.
When they reached him again, he maintained that the documents he submitted were original and from the facility.
The AIU concluded that the athlete had provided false or misleading information and that the Nyahururu and Iten prescriptions failed to explain the presence of the banned substance. He was found guilty of providing forged or falsified documents and a further violation of tampering.
The ADAK Act also states that it is a criminal offense in Kenya for someone to use forged or falsified medical certificates.
Njenga owns a marathon best of 2:06:38 from the 2020 Sevilla Marathon.
