Barred from competing at the Rio Games, Russia's double Olympic champion Yelena Isinbayeva announced her retirement on Friday and said whoever won the women's pole vault in her absence would not have achieved a proper gold medal. At a combative news conference, Isinbayeva also said God would be the judge of whether athletics' governing body was right to exclude almost the entire Russian track and field team, including herself, over what it said was incontrovertible evidence of state-sponsored doping.
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.
Twice Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva intends to prove in court that an IAAF ban on Russian athletes from international competition is a violation of human rights, TASS news agency reported on Friday. Meanwhile, Russia's Sports Ministry said it was extremely disappointed by the IAAF's decision to uphold a ban of all Russian track-and-field athletes from international competition and the Rio Olympics would be diminished by their absence.
Twice Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva will stand in the All-Russian Athletics Federation (ARAF) presidential election this year, she said on Wednesday.
World pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva has been named Russia's Athlete of the Year in a nationwide poll conducted by sports journalists.
Rediff.com's Day 4 guide to Moscow World Athletic championships.
Double Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva's return to competition was frustrated by a leg injury on Saturday when she had to drop out of the Russian Grand Prix in her home city of Volgograd. Isinbayeva, Olympic champion in 2004 and 2008, had been due to return to competition for the first time since the birth of her daughter in June 2014. "I really hate to disappoint people but today when I was warming up I felt a sharp pain while making a jump and I understood that if I continued to jump I could tear a muscle," Isinbayeva, 33, told the All Sport news agency. "It's an old injury in my Achilles tendon in my lead-off leg," she added.
Yelena Isinbayeva is to run for president of the Russian athletics federation (ARAF), the double Olympic pole vault champion said.
Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva was elected to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) athletes' commission on Thursday, despite being barred from the Rio Games over doping allegations.
Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva has applied to world athletics governing body IAAF to compete at the Rio Olympics despite Russia's ban, athletics authorities in Moscow on Thursday. "Isinbayeva sent her application on Wednesday," Alla Glushchenko, the spokeswoman for the Russian athletics federation, told AFP.
Russian star pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva said on Wednesday she plans to retire after the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, where she has her sights sets on a third Olympic gold.
Most celebrations during the World Athletics Championships are over the top. But how does it matter as long as the spectators enjoy them!
Rediff.com gives a quick tour through BEST Photos of the Week!
Isinbayeva was under pressure to quit as head of RUSADA's supervisory council after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) called for her removal, one of four steps it said were necessary for RUSADA to retrieve its right to oversee the testing of Russian athletes.
A week after swelling national pride by winning the world pole vault title and defending Russia's anti-gay propaganda law, Yelena Isinbayeva wants to leave her run-down hometown for wealthy Monaco.
Russian pole vault queen Yelena Isinbayeva said on Friday she is opposed to sexual discrimination, and that her English comments in support of her country's anti-gay propaganda law may have been misconstrued.
Yelena Isinbayeva has lent her support, rather controversially, to the new anti-gay propaganda law in her native Russia and has now received flak for her stand from fellow athletes.
Watching her every move like a hawk from his front row seat in the Luzhniki Stadium, Yefgeny Trofimov never lost faith that Yelena Isinbayeva could rise again.
Yelena Isinbayeva, the greatest woman pole vaulter of all time, thrilled a partisan home crowd roaring her every jump when she landed the third and probably last world title of her illustrious career on Tuesday.
Russian pole vault queen and double Olympic champion Yelena Isinbayeva has announced that she would be retiring after the world athletics championships, which take place in her home country in Moscow, Russia, in August, AFP reported.
Analysis of the field events in the women's athletics programme.
The just-concluded World Athletics Championships in Moscow was not just about speed and endurance. There was beauty too. These ten female athletes, we think, were the sexiest of the track and field extravaganza.
The world championships finally caught fire on Tuesday as the fans turned up to say farewell to Yelena Isinbayeva, only for the Russian pole vault queen to roll back the years and win an emotional gold medal against all the odds.
Olympic champion Jenn Suhr lit up the US indoor athletics championships on Saturday by leaping 5.02 metres to set a new women's pole vault world record.
Russia are aiming to repeat their third place finish in the medals table at Beijing in 2008 when the squad competes at next month's London Olympics, Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said on Tuesday.
There were twists, turns and a back flip at the World indoor championships on Sunday but no World records, despite pole vault winner Yelena Isinbayeva's best efforts.
Yelena Isinbayeva is back at the peak of her powers as she bids to become the first female track and field athlete to win three successive Olympic golds in what is likely to be her last Games.
Yelena Isinbayeva became the latest victim of a curious curse at the world athletics championships on Tuesday, while Grenadian Kirani James lit up the track in the 400 metres to become the third youngest ever world champion.
Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva, chasing her third straight Olympic gold medal at the London Games this year, says the strain of training will force her to retire in two years.
Olympic champion and world pole vault record holder Yelena Isinbayeva made an unimpressive return to competition after an 11-month break by winning a low-key indoor meeting on Sunday.
Russia's two-time Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva on Saturday announced that she is taking an indefinite break from the sport, following her poor performance in last month's World Indoor Championships in Qatar.
Olympic pole vault champion and world record holder Yelena Isinbayeva will end her 'boring' break from the sport in February, the Russian said on Monday. Isinbayeva will return at the Pole Vault Stars competition promoted by her role model and legendary vaulter Sergey Bubka in the Ukrainian city of Donetsk, nearly a year after she said she was taking an indefinite break.
World pole vault record holder Yelena Isinbayeva returns to action on Sunday after almost a year out to repair a battered ego and rediscover her love of the sport. She is feeling, she says, not a shred of nerves.
Russia will be represented in most sports at the Rio Olympics, with 271 of its sportsmen and women cleared to participate ahead of the opening ceremony, Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) head Alexander Zhukov has said.
Olympic pole vault champion and world record holder Yelena Isinbayeva will not compete this season but hopes to come back stronger next year, her coach said on Friday.
Olympic 100m champion and world record holder Usain Bolt has agreed to be an ambassador at the August 14-26 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore.
Olympic and world champion Usain Bolt won the 100 metres with a late surge at the Weltklasse Golden League meeting on Friday while Russian Yelena Isinbayeva broke her own world record in the women's pole vault.
Yelena Isinbayeva announced that she will be taking an 'indefinite break' from competition. The Russian world record holder's decision follows her failure at the World outdoor championships, another shock defeat at the World indoors in Doha last month.
World tennis number one Roger Federer won the prestigious Laureus Sportsman of the Year award for a record fourth year in a row on Monday.