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The IAAF World Race Walking Team Championships is a race walking event organized by the International Association of Athletics Federations. It has been held since 1961, and generally on a biennial basis. Women first entered the 1979 edition. It was formerly known as the Lugano Cup after the city that hosted the first event. In 2004, a Junior division was added, consisting of Men and Women which are 19 or younger.
Contents
Host cities
The 2016 Cup was due to be held in Cheboksary, Russia. However the IAAF's suspension of the All-Russia Athletic Federation prohibits Russia from hosting international competitions. This event was relocated.
50 kilometres
†: In 2008, Vladimir Kanaykin from Russia was initially 2nd and silver medallist in 3:36:55, but disqualified because of doping violations.
‡: In 2012, Igor Erokhin from Russia was initially 2nd and silver medallist in 3:38:10, but disqualified because of doping violations.
5 kilometres
† Invitational, non-cup event.
Doping
The competition conducts doping tests on participating athletes and several have been disqualified from the races as a result. Ukraine's Olga Leonenko became the first doping disqualification, having originally finished seventh in 1995. Daniel Plaza became the first man in 1997 and was again disqualified in 1999. Nine years passed without incident then in 2008 two Russians were excluded Viktor Burayev and Vladimir Kanaykin – the latter was the first athlete to be stripped of a medal at the cup.
In 2010 fourth place Erik Tysse was removed. Four athletes were disqualified for doping at the 2012 edition: silver medallist Igor Yerokhin was the most prominent, followed by fifth place Sergey Morozov, then Turkish walkers Recep Çelik and Handan Koçyiğit Cavdar. Yuriy Andronov became the fifth Russian to be caught doping at the event in 2014.
Outside of the event, several medallists have been later disqualified for doping, including women's winners Olga Kaniskina and Elena Lashmanova, and men's runners-up Valeriy Borchin and Alex Schwazer.