Peres Jepchirchir: The EPO Sample and a Ledger That Never Closes

August 30, 2026, Sydney. Peres Jepchirchir won the marathon in 2:18:31. A lead of more than three minutes – over her compatriot Irene Chepet Cheptai. It was another major win in her career. New York 2026, Boston 2026, London 2026 – and now Sydney 2026, which became the seventh World Marathon Major in 2026. But when I open my ledger, the first thing I see is the date the sample was taken – before the race, in Kenya. The Athletics Integrity Unit has provisionally suspended her. Positive for EPO. A scan is a photograph; a ledger is a film. Only one shows what happens next.

I have seen this scene many times in four decades – a win, a time, an achievement, and then a sample that changes everything. In 2026, when I was at The Telegraph, Kolkata, the story was different. There was no AIU, no biological passport. Now we have everything – yet the story is the same. Kenya, Ethiopia, and now another name added to the list. It is nothing new, but every time it shocks us anew. Perhaps because we forget. We hope this time will be different. And then another ledger entry arrives.

Jepchirchir is no ordinary runner. At 33, she has achieved everything a marathon runner can achieve – Olympic gold, World Championship gold, world records. She won the Olympic title in Tokyo 2026. In September 2026, she returned to Tokyo to win the World Championships. In 2026, the half-marathon world record. In 2026, she broke her own record three times. This list is a document, and every document has a date. And now, a date before August 30, 2026 – the date her sample was taken – has become the most important page in this document.

But here I open another ledger – Kenya's. This is a country that has given the world its greatest runners. Kipchoge, Kipruto, Jepchirchir – a long list of names. But doping cases have also come from this country. In 2026, CAS banned four Kenyan athletes – all relay members, all from the same coaching group. At the time, Kenyan officials called them 'isolated cases'. But the documents say it was a pattern. In 2026, more cases emerged. In the 2020s, the series continues. Every time, the same story: an athlete, a substance, an 'unfortunate' case. But I look at the documents, and the documents say this is not 'unfortunate' – this is a pattern. Eleven soft-tissue injuries in one season is not luck. It is a system speaking. And here, eleven positive tests are also the language of a system.

Now, let us understand EPO. Erythropoietin is a natural substance produced in the kidneys. It stimulates the bone marrow to produce red blood cells. More red blood cells in the blood means more oxygen reaching the muscles. In endurance sports, this is a huge advantage – especially in a sport like the marathon, where oxygen supply is everything. But if injected, it is detectable in urine or blood only for a short window. That is why it is a 'favourite' substance – and that is why Jepchirchir's case is so important.

The history of EPO begins in the 1980s, when it spread rapidly in endurance sports. At the 2026 Sydney Olympics, a new blood test was introduced that could detect EPO. But to this day, it remains a challenge – both the amount of EPO detected and the detection window are limited. That is why out-of-competition testing is so important. You cannot wait until the athlete injects the substance before the race. You have to catch them in sleep, in training, at home. And that is why Jepchirchir's sample was taken in Kenya – before the race, randomly.

The AIU says the sample was taken in Kenya, before the race. It was an out-of-competition test. It was according to the rules – random, without notice. This is the same method I adopted in 2026 in Gold Coast, when I audited the medical files of 23 Indian track athletes. I found four unreported stress reactions. But here the difference is: a stress reaction is an injury, EPO is a decision. One is a failure of the body, the other of conscience. I can forgive load-driven injuries – the body has limits, and sometimes they break. But EPO is a calculation. It is a plan. And plans have a date.

The question is: when an athlete has been passing so many tests for so many years, why did this sample come now? Was this her first EPO, or just one detected part of a long process? I do not have the answer. But I have a ledger, and every entry in the ledger is a question. Nobody dated the first warning, so I did – wrist or hamstring, the silence is identical. Here, the first warning had no date – only a sample that came back positive. And when there is no date for a warning, we ignore it. We say, 'it is an isolated case'. But in a ledger, there are no isolated cases.

In 2026, I was a 400m hurdler. I tore my hamstring. That is when I learned that the body cannot be fooled. You can tell warm-up stories, but the body can be read like an Excel sheet. I applied this lesson in 2026 in Guntur, when I saw 11 hamstring strains in 72 hours. I built a ledger of 48 sprinters' weekly load spikes. I found that 68 percent of strains occurred in the third week of a load jump above 15 percent. It was a pattern. And seeing the pattern, I made a return-to-play checklist. Here, I see another ledger of Kenya's doping cases. There is no load spike, but there is another number: every year, how many Kenyan athletes test positive? And every year, how many cases are dismissed as 'unfortunate'?

In Kenya, athletics is an industry. At the altitude of Eldoret and Iten, thousands of young runners train. They run 2,400 meters above sea level, where the air is thin and the body produces more red blood cells. This is a natural advantage. But some people try to artificially enhance this natural advantage – and here comes EPO. It is an irony: those who naturally have the most red blood cells also try to increase them artificially. This all may seem 'unrelated' to EPO, but this is the environment where an athlete makes a wrong decision. It is the same mentality I have seen in India – where an athlete's job becomes more important than health, and where one wrong suggestion from a coach – 'this is a new medicine, it is safe' – can end a career.

In the women's marathon, the pressure is even greater. Compared to men, women have fewer prize money and sponsorship opportunities, but expectations are no less. Athletes like Jepchirchir carry the hopes of their family, their village, their country on their shoulders. When you win a race by three minutes, it is not just a victory; it is financial security. And when so much is at stake, some people may choose the wrong path. It is not fair, but it is a reality.

In 2026, during the lockdown, I was auditing the home training programs of 63 Indian athletes. I found that 41 percent had no physio access. I designed a remote video gait screen for 18 javelin throwers and found three shoulder asymmetries above 12 percent. Then I thought, if we can see body asymmetry through video frames, why can't we see the asymmetry of conscience through a sample? But it is not that easy. Detecting EPO is a scientific process, and scientific processes are precise. They do not accept the word 'unfortunate'. They only see numbers – and the numbers say a sample is positive.

Now, what is Jepchirchir's future? She can appeal the provisional suspension. She can request a B-sample. She can try to prove the sample was contaminated or that there was an error in the process. But these are all legal paths, not scientific ones. And until the B-sample is confirmed, we are only talking about a provisional suspension. It is a word that means 'temporary' in legal language, but its impact on a career can be permanent. I have seen many athletes who won their appeals, but a question mark always remained on their legacy. Because once you are accused, the accusation never fully goes away.

Her victory in the Sydney Marathon will now be recorded with a question mark. Was that win possible without EPO? Perhaps yes. She is a talented runner, and she has won before without controversy. But this question will always stay with her now. That is the biggest crime of doping – it not only contaminates that race, but puts a question mark on all the victories she won before. It is a ledger that looks backwards and re-counts every entry. And when a ledger re-counts, some entries become blurred.

I often say, In 2026 I screened bodies through a laptop and learned they lie less than press conferences. It is true. Bodies do not lie – they tell the truth through injuries. But a sample? A sample is a chemical truth. It does not say 'I am innocent' or 'it was a mistake'. It only says this substance is present. And that is the only truth we need to know right now. The rest – appeal, hearing, verdict – is part of the legal process, and we must respect it. But we should not call it 'unfortunate', and we should not call it a 'mistake'. We should call it what it is: a sample, a substance, a positive result.

I know some people will turn this into a 'comeback narrative'. 'She will return', 'it was a mistake', 'she is a warrior'. I do not agree. The comeback narrative erases exactly the record I exist to keep. It turns a preventable event into a character trait. Jepchirchir is a great runner, that is true. But greatness is not a license – it is a responsibility. And when that responsibility is broken, we should not call it a 'mistake', but a documented failure. The second injury is never an accident. It is a receipt. Here, the first offence is also a receipt – a receipt from a system that encourages athletes to work against their own bodies, or at least does not stop them.

Is it fair to treat Jepchirchir like a criminal while she is only on provisional suspension? No. The judicial process must be followed. Every person must be presumed innocent until proven guilty. This is the basic principle of law. But at the same time, we must not forget that this is not the first case. In Kenya's doping history, this is another entry. And as long as we see it as an entry, not a pattern, it will be repeated. The graph I presented in Gold Coast in 2026 showed that Indian track athletes had 2.4 times the recurrence rate of World Cup footballers. In injuries, we measure recurrence. In doping, we must also measure recurrence – and here the recurrence rate is very high.

Jepchirchir's legacy is now entering a new chapter. She is one of the greatest marathon runners in history – that cannot change. But in history, a new page has been added, and on this page there is only one sentence: EPO, positive, provisional suspension. This sentence cannot erase all her achievements, but it can show them in a different light. And it is a lesson for all of us that the ledger never closes. It always remains open, always keeps growing, and always reminds those who want to see that the past is never really the past.

The question is not whether Jepchirchir will run again. At 33, she can still run – after an appeal, after a ban, whatever the outcome. The question is how Kenya's athletics board will record this entry in its ledger – as a new case, or as part of a pattern. Because until they see it as a pattern, it will be repeated. And every time, another great athlete, another 'unfortunate' case, another ledger entry. I have seen this cycle for four decades – in India, in Kenya, all over the world. And until we break this cycle, we will keep repeating the same story.

One last thing. When I was in Guntur in 2026, I made a one-page return-to-play checklist. It said: 'No comeback begins on the day of the injury; it begins on the day you accept that the injury happened.' The same principle applies to doping. Jepchirchir's case will not be resolved until she accepts that there is a problem – whether that acceptance is of innocence or guilt. And this acceptance must come not only from her, but from the entire athletics structure of her country. Because in a ledger, every entry is a signature. And every signature is a responsibility.