Dwain Chambers insists that he is not at war with athletics chiefs, but he could be left battle-scarred and broke as he tries to relaunch his career. The sprinter will find out today whether he is among the first wave of athletes selected in the Great Britain team for next month’s World Indoor Championships in Valencia, but his future remains clouded in uncertainty.
The immediate issue is whether he will run in the Norwich Union Indoor Grand Prix in Birmingham on Saturday. Fast Track is the meeting promoter, but it is a UK Athletics event and, given the ongoing row between the governing body and Chambers, there could be a farcical situation in which he is selected and excluded in the same day.
The consensus arising from Chambers’s victory in the 60 metres at the World Indoor Trials and UK Championships on Sunday was that UKA is legally bound to pick Chambers, who completed a two-year doping ban in 2005, for next month’s event. Lynn Davies, the UKA president, suggested that the panel, which met yesterday, was now “obliged to select him”, although there is a clause in the selection criteria allowing for value judgments in exceptional circumstances.
“If he is not selected on that basis, we would argue it is an arbitrary decision and a restraint of trade,” Nick Collins, Chambers’s lawyer, told The Times yesterday. “We have had no indication that they will do that.” But what lies ahead for Chambers? Niels de Vos, the UKA chief executive, has promised a review of selection policy and wants to make two key changes. The first would mean that an athlete had to be subjected to 12 months of out-of-competition testing before being eligible.The second would give UKA the right to pick who it wants with regards to performance and reputation. Both changes would have ruled out Chambers, but both will be tested if introduced retrospectively.
There are other obstacles for Chambers, who is “running for free” and being supported by his partner. The Association of Athletics Managers said that its members will not represent those who are banned for two years, while Euromeetings, a body of 40 event organisers, has urged its members not to offer invitations to anyone who causes negative publicity.
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Although Euromeetings has no authority over the promoters, Rajne Soderberg, the organisation’s president, said that Chambers was precisely the sort of person it would not want. If the promoters agree, Chambers will be barred from the Golden League, the IAAF Grands Prix and most European permit meetings.
Fast Track is a member of Euromeetings, but a spokesman said that it did not know whether Chambers would be asked to Birmingham. “I would love to be invited,” Chambers said. “I want to compete, have fun and make Britain look good again. I don’t understand what the problem is.”
De Vos has been accused of double standards in taking a hard stance on Chambers while Linford Christie, who served a drugs ban when semi-retired, is a UKA coach. UKA also backed Carl Myerscough’s appeal against his BOA ban before the Athens Olympics, despite the shot putter testing positive for “a cocktail of banned substances”. De Vos argues that the case of Chambers is different because the sprinter has had only one test in more than a year.
When Chambers first returned to the British team at the European Cup in M?laga in 2006, UKA had to pay for his travel after UK Sport, which bankrolled the British team, said that he could not receive public money.
De Vos said on Sunday that he did not know if Chambers would travel with the team if selected, but said it would be “deeply uncomfortable” if he did.
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However, not one athlete has said that he should be barred from competing. “They are the rules,” Chris Tomlinson, the long jumper, said. “But I’ve never felt a two-year ban for doping is enough. I more or less missed that much through injury - it’s a blip on a career rather than the end of it.”
Simeon Williamson, the rising star who staked his claim for Valencia by finishing second in the 60metres, has received tips from Chambers while training at Lee Valley in London.
An unpalatable aspect of UKA’s stance was that it resulted in Craig Pickering, an advocate of life bans for dopers, being elevated to white knight status. Pickering started the season in world-class form and could have been UKA’s hero had he beaten Chambers. However, the pressure appeared to get to him and he struggled home in fifth, departing with a face like thunder. UKA must hope that the bitter experience has not dented the confidence of one of the country’s brightest talents.
Deciding factors
Six people have a vote on Chambers’s future. They are:
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Dave Collins (UKA performance director)
John Trower (senior performance coach, sprints)
Aston Moore (senior performance coach, field events)
Alan Storey (senior performance coach, endurance)
Neil Black (acting head, medicine and sports science)
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Simon Nathan (performance programme manager)