With no Russians, few stars and the sport engulfed in a doping crisis the world indoor athletics championships begin this week with officials holding their breath and eager to put the spotlight back on the track.
Spectacular IMAGES from the closing ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics held in Pyeongchang, South Korea
Damaging wind gusts, a fresh doping controversy and the robbery of a visiting government minister presented the Rio Games with a perfect storm of problems on Sunday, forcing organisers to scramble to keep the world's biggest sporting event rolling on.
Chinese Olympic women's swimmer Chen Xinyi tested positive for a banned substance at the Rio Olympics on August 7, state media said on Friday citing the country's swimming association, the latest doping scandal to mar competition at the Games.
The Belarus team carried Russia's flag as well as their own at the Paralympic Games opening ceremony, in a show of support for their near-neighbours, who were banned from the competition in Rio de Janeiro. The head of the Russian Paralympic Committee (RPC) Vladimir Lukin told the TASS news agency that he was grateful for the gesture at the ceremony on Wednesday night.
Olympic medallist who fled Belarus forced into exile again as Ukraine attacked
Bach's two-day visit to Tokyo is likely to bolster Japan's efforts to stage the Olympics, but will do little to assuage the concerns of a public deeply worried about the spread of the virus.
Evidence of widespread state-sponsored doping by Russian athletes at the Sochi Olympics was confirmed on Monday in a report by an independent commission of the World Anti-Doping Agency.
Breakdancing, considered one of the pillars of hip-hop culture, will also make its Asian Games bow in 2022, two years before it features in the Olympics for the first time in Paris.
Speaking to Reuters during a WADA meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, Tygart said as long as sports bodies were represented on WADA, the anti-doping organisation could not deliver on its promise to crack down on cheats.
IOC ethics committee looks into Rio payment claims
Russia has lost its appeal against its ban from next month's Rio Paralympics because of a state-sponsored doping programme, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), sports highest tribunal, said on Tuesday. The decision to exclude Russia's entire Paralympics team, initially made on Aug. 7 by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), means at least 250 Russian competitors are set to miss the Sept. 7-18 event.
Russian President Vladimir Putin believes that WADA has violated the Olympic Charter in banning Russia and hence they have a ground to appeal.
A member of the Belarus delegation who carried a Russian flag at the Paralympic opening ceremony to support his country's near-neighbor that is banned from the competition was stripped of his accreditation, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) said on Thursday.
The tally from the weekend showed 37 new cases on Sunday with most testing positive after arrival at the airport
On Sunday the Ukrainian Tennis Federation urged the sport's governing body the International Tennis Federation (ITF) to immediately expel Russia and Belarus from the organisation and ban Russia from team and individual tournaments. Also, athletes from Ukraine and other nations have called on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to suspend Russia and Belarus and ban their athletes from events immediately.
Israel, Andorra, Argentina, Bolivia and Ukraine were also found non-compliant of the WADA Code and can no longer conduct anti-doping programs
Tennis star Martina Navratilova and US basketball player Jason Collins said on Tuesday the International Olympic Committee has not done enough to defend the rights of gay athletes ahead of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
'Football is in full solidarity with all the people affected in Ukraine. Both Presidents hope that the situation in Ukraine will improve significantly and rapidly so that football can again be a vector for unity and peace.'
Russian federal investigators said on Saturday they had opened a criminal case against the country's former anti-doping chief on charges of abuse of office.
Maksym Bordus, who was born in 2000, had signed up to fight for the Ukrainian army on the first day of Russia's full-scale invasion in February last year.
India won four gold at the IBA Women's World Championships in a depleted field. To put things in perspective, five of the boycotting nations -- USA, Ireland, Canada, Poland and Netherlands -- had finished in the top-10 in the last two editions of the tournament.
The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) on Sunday banned all Russians from its own Games next month because of the widespread doping culture that it says has polluted sport in the country.
The decision not to impose a blanket ban was not uniformly welcomed with Travis Tygart, head of the United States Anti-Doping Agency, describing it as "yet another devastating blow to clean athletes."
Russia asks World Athletics to postpone decision on possible expulsion.
Double Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva, a fierce critic of a Russian track and field ban at the Rio Olympics, was elected an International Olympic Committee member on Sunday but a third of the votes were against her.
Boston was selected on Thursday as the American candidate city that will bid to host the 2024 Olympics.
Just days before the eight-year deadline expires, the IOC formally stripped American cyclist Tyler Hamilton of his 2004 gold for doping Friday and awarded the medal to a Russian rider who now becomes a three-time Olympic champion.
Russian tennis player Maria Sharapova has been provisionally named in her country's squad for the forthcoming Rio Olympics.
The former head of world athletics is suspected of receiving just over 1 million euros ($1.09 million) in bribes in 2011 to cover up positive doping tests of Russian athletes, the office of France's financial prosecutor said on Thursday.
In the ongoing Women's World Championship, Jaismine Lamboria clinched her opening bout on Friday.
Triggering angry criticism from the West and even calls to boycott the Sochi games, Russia adopted in June a ban on homosexual "propaganda" among minors, a law denounced by critics as discriminatory and aimed at stifling dissent.
The World Anti-Doping Agency is not fit for purpose and should be replaced, Britain's double Olympic decathlon champion Daley Thompson has said following its decision last month to lift a ban on Russia's anti-doping body.
Thomas Bach has virtually complete control over the body and by far the biggest influence on whether the Games will go ahead or not. With the Games having only been cancelled in the past due to World Wars One and Two, Bach will undoubtedly do everything in his power to protect the IOC's prime product
Thomas Bach's response to a report that found Russia concealed hundreds of positive doping tests ahead of the Sochi Winter Games will determine his legacy as International Olympic Committee president, athletes leaders said on Monday.
European Athletics president Svein Arne Hansen does not expect Russia to return to international competition in time for next year's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
While Sochi scrambles to get ready in time for Friday's opening ceremony, the International Olympic Committee cast its eyes past the most expensive Games ever staged and began to look for ways of revamping the global sporting spectacular.
About 41,000 rooms are being provided for the Games and any failure to have them ready in time would be a potential blow to President Vladimir Putin's hopes that the Winter Olympics will show how far Russia has come since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Russia was stripped of their women's 4 x 400m relay silver medal from the London 2012 Olympics after Antonina Krivoshapka tested positive for drugs in the re-testing of her sample, the International Olympic Committee said on Wednesday.
Three senior athletics officials have had their provisional suspension from the sport extended by the IAAF's Ethics Board as it continues its investigation into their alleged involvement in a suspected cover-up of Russian doping cases.
