ATHLETICS

Derek Redmond will make a final attempt to revive his injury-affected career. Redmond, the former British 400 metres record holder, has had eight operations during his career and has already retired once. But his coach Tony Hadley said: "Derek had another operation in November on a partial Achilles tear that developed last summer. He is now going along reasonably well, but we are being ultra cautious. He might have a race or two in August and, if everything goes right, he hopes to have a shot at the Olympic Games in Atlanta."

Antoni Niemczak, the Polish marathon runner, faces a two-year suspension after testing positive for a banned drug for the second time. The 29-year- old athlete tested positive for the stimulant ephredrine at the Tokyo international marathon on 12 February.

Twenty-four Kenyan athletes urged the International Amateur Athletic Federation yesterday to lift a four-year ban on the former world cross- country champion John Ngugi for refusing a random dope test. "We know Ngugi did wrong by failing to accept a dope test. We also know there were special circumstances," they said in a letter to the IAAF in Monaco. It was signed by Kenya Athletes' Commission chairman and steeplechaser Patrick Sang and 23 other athletes, including the world cross-country champion Paul Tergat, the Olympic 800 metres champion, William Tanui, and the 3,000m steeplechase record holder Moses Kiptanui. The athletes said they knew of worse cases where banned athletes were reinstated on technical grounds but tests showed they had used drugs.