Athletics: Wilkins given two-year ban for drugs

Perriss Wilkins, named last weekend as one of the two British record holders to have tested positive for the banned steroid methandienone, has been banned for two years by UK Athletics.

The 34-year-old Banbury discus thrower, who was initially suspended on 11 June after his sample from an out-of-competition test was confirmed as being adverse, received his standard ban yesterday following the judgement of an independent disciplinary committee.

"The independent disciplinary committee chaired by Colin Ross-Munro QC has decided that Perriss Wilkins committed a doping offence as a result of a positive sample provided on 21 May, 2002," a UK Athletics statement said. "Perriss Wilkins is therefore now ineligible to take part in athletics events for two years. The period of ineligibility runs from 11 June, 2002, the date the athlete was suspended."

The news that Wilkins, who set his first British record in 1997 and extended it to 66.64 metres in a minor meeting at Birmingham University a year later, had tested adversely for methandienone came out at the same time that another name was released in connection with the same substance, the British pole vault record holder Janine Whitlock.

The 28-year-old Dewsbury athlete, who tested positive after raising her own record to 4.41m in winning last month's Commonwealth Trials in Manchester, has until Tuesday to provide any additional data before a Drug Advisory Officer will determine whether she has a case to answer. If the answer to that question is yes, she will be suspended pending her own independent review. If the answer is no, she will be able to join the England team which starts competition in Manchester three days later.

The adverse test Wilkins produced on 21 May was not the first time he had brought suspicion of cheating upon himself. When he took part in the AAA Championships and World Trials in 1999, he was found to be in possession of an underweight discus before competition got under way.

A lengthy inquiry allowed him off with a warning, but several figures within the AAA were openly critical of the outcome. In the wake of the inquiry, more stringent rules on the checking of equipment were introduced.