Russia doping investigator pressed to name names

Richard McLaren, the Canadian lawyer who produced the explosive report on state-run doping in Russia, said he has had a "deluge" of requests to name individual athletes implicated in his investigation. With the start of the Rio Olympics six days away, McLaren said in a statement that sports federations tasked by the International Olympic Committee to determine which Russians can compete have flooded him with requests to name athletes implicated in connection with his probe. "At this stage, I will not release any of the specific information I currently have concerning any athletes," he said in the report released late Friday by his office in London, Ontario. "To do so would compromise the ongoing investigation." He said the IOC decision not to impose a blanket Russian ban, and instead have federations insure that no one implicated in the report competes in Rio, "has resulted in a deluge of requests to provide information to the IFs (international federations); Russian national federations; the Russian Olympic Committee; the Russian Paralympic Committee and individual Russian athletes". McLaren said his mandate from the World Anti-Doping Agency was to investigate claims of a state dicatated program that used the Moscow and Sochi laboratories to cover up doping. "It has not been to establish anti-doping rule violation cases against individual athletes," he said. McLaren said his investigation did find evidence of individual athletes whose urine samples were part of the doping system and he had shared their names with WADA. WADA has given the names to sports federations, and with the opening ceremony looming on Friday more than 117 Russian athletes of the 387 initially announced by the Russian Olympic Committee have been excluded. While McLaren said he will not release names of individuals implicated by his research, his investigation could lead to doping violation cases against individuals.