Ian Thompson was ‘unethically’ involved in Anne Wafula Strike being moved out of his wife’s category, says former head coach

The part played by the husband of the 11-time Paralympic champion Tanni Grey-Thompson in reclassifying her closest rival has been condemned by a former senior UK Athletics official.

Peter Eriksson, a former head coach at UKA’s Paralympic programme, said the involvement of Ian Thompson in the reclassification of Anne Wafula Strike was unethical, in evidence submitted to a parliamentary committee.

Wafula Strike, who is paralysed from the chest down after contracting polio at the age of two, competed in the same T53 category as Grey-Thompson in 2006 and was edging closer to the champion’s times.

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In written evidence to the select committee, Eriksson stated: “[At the] 2006 IPC [International Paralympic Committee] world championships one team coach, Ian Thompson, asked for a reclassification of a GB athlete, Anne Strike, which would give his personal athlete less competition, Tanni Grey-Thompson.” He said Thompson’s decision to protest against Wafula Strike’s classification was unethical given his connection to her rival.

However, after Thompson suggested she be reassessed, Wafula Strike was reclassified into a more able-bodied category, despite her medical records going missing before the test.

It is not clear whether Thompson’s intervention was the only trigger for the reassessment.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘I was never allowed to reach my potential as an athlete.’ Anne Wafula Strike at her home. Photograph: Martin Godwin/The Guardian

Kathryn Periac, a former UKA assistant performance manager, has also raised concerns about the process by which Wafula Strike was reclassified. Periac recalled an incident during the 2006 Paralympic World Cup in Manchester.

Thompson, who was then UKA’s wheelchair racing head coach with overall responsibility for both his wife and Wafula Strike, “began to engage me in conversation about Anne’s classification being questionable”. Periac said she told Thompson she felt Wafula Strike “completely met the profile” for a T53 athlete. T53 is a category in which athletes have full use of their arms but have no or limited trunk function.

Eriksson and Periac have made their claims in written submissions to the digital, culture, media and sport committee’s ongoing inquiry into sports governance. This week the committee heard claims that cheating as a result of disabled athletes competing in the wrong class is a significant problem in the sport. The International Paralympic Committee has rejected these claims.

Speaking exclusively to the Guardian, Wafula Strike claimed the reclassification “effectively ended” her career. She said: “It is too late for me … but I want to speak out to try to help other athletes who are in the sport now.”

“I came into the sport late, at the age of 30. I loved it so much,” said Wafula Strike, who took up wheelchair racing after she came to the UK from Kenya in 2000. “But because of what happened to me I was never allowed to reach my potential as an athlete. What might have been had I not been treated unjustly haunts me every day.”

I knew that an unjust decision had been made Anne Wafula Strike

Lady Grey-Thompson was made a dame in 2005 and a baroness in 2010 in recognition of her contribution to Paralympic sport, having previously been made an MBE and OBE. She married Ian Thompson in 1999. She confirmed to the Guardian that her husband had raised concerns over Wafula Strike’s classification but insisted she had no personal or vested interest in the change to her rival’s status since the incident happened when she was nearing her retirement in 2007.

Asked if she discussed Wafula Strike’s reclassification with her husband, she said: “As a couple we discussed many things around the sport as you might expect but it was many years ago.”

She added: “What was regrettable … is how Anne was treated. I believe that the system let her down.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Anne Wafula Strike, second left, races in the women’s 100m T54 final during the Visa London Disability Athletics Challenge in May 2012. Photograph: Julian Finney/Getty Images

Six years after she arrived in the UK, Wafula Strike gained British citizenship and joined Team GB. Competing in the same T53 wheelchair racing class as Grey-Thompson, she quickly established herself as the champion’s closest rival.

But following her reclassification Wafula Strike struggled to recreate her success against less severely disabled competitors. Despite new medical evidence later commissioned by UK Athletics that suggested her reclassification had been a mistake, she was never restored to her original class.

Asked by the committee chair, Damian Collins, whether she felt Wafula Strike had been treated badly, Grey-Thompson said: “The duty of care that should be applied to all athletes in the system wasn’t applied by the system.” She pointed out that she was not on the classification panel when Wafula Strike was reclassified. She was not asked about her husband’s role in the decision.

Quick guide What is para-sport classification? Show Hide Athletes are grouped in classes according to their activity limitation in a certain sport, supposedly allowing for fair competition between those with different types of disability. There are 10 so-called 'eligible impairments' but not every sport admits competitors from every one of those Does everyone in a class have the same impairment? No. For example, athletes with paraplegia and double amputees might compete in the same class in athletics because their different impairments have a comparable effect on their wheelchair racing performance. In Paralympic sport, each class is given a code relating to the severity of the impairment and the type of disability How are athletes classified? Each sport trains and certifies individuals to conduct athlete evaluation by classifiers who either have a medical background or are technical experts in their sport. They will conduct a series of tests to decide which class an athlete should compete in, while each sport has a committee to monitor their work. Classifiers will also then monitor athletes in competition.



In her evidence, which is yet to be published by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport select committee but has been seen by the Guardian, Periac says she believes Wafula Strike’s reclassification was a mistake. “As an experienced coach of world-class T53 athletes I had no doubt of Anne’s class,” she wrote. “All I saw supported Anne as a T53 athlete and to confirm that I asked the team physiotherapist … to complete a muscle profiling of Anne’s body. Her report clearly confirmed that Anne had no trunk or leg function, and completely met the profile of a T53 athlete.”

But despite her assessment, which Periac said was later supported by new expert medical evidence, the reclassification went ahead.

Periac said of the doctor who conducted Wafula Strike’s reclassification test: “Unfortunately, he had been convinced that Anne was cheating, and therefore been blind to the actual evidence in front of him during Anne’s classification.”

One of the irregularities about Wafula Strike’s classification was that her medical records went missing before the test. In his evidence to the select committee, Eriksson said this showed handling of medical files at UK Athletics was “not acceptable”.

In an interview in 2011, Thompson told the Sunday Times he had privately told officials that Wafula Strike exhibited too much body movement for a person of her supposed disability and should not be allowed to race in the same category as his wife.

Thompson told the Sunday Times: “I’d had a discussion with the head coach and said, ‘You need to look at this because if you look at the way in which Anne is now starting she is using a lot more body function than one would expect from a T53.’”

Thompson added that he never believed Wafula Strike had been guilty of cheating.



Periac said she commissioned a medical report for Wafula Strike in 2008 that involved nerve conduction tests.

“The specialists advised there was zero possibility of hiding any existing function that was present and that was why we proceeded to organise these tests for Anne,” she said in her evidence. “Just before I left UKA I was briefed on the outcome, which was a categoric confirmation that Anne did not have the trunk function she was said to have.

“I have no hesitation in stating that Anne would have been a highly successful T53 competitor, without question a potential podium winner, at both the 2006 world championships and 2008 Paralympic Games,” she added. “Her reclassification cost her so much, including many tens of thousands of pounds in lottery funding and sponsorships from external bodies.”

Wafula Strike said that after the devastation of her reclassification at the 2006 world championships she was asked whether she wanted to leave the competition and go home. “I refused and stayed on to race in the T54 class. I was crying so much I couldn’t even see the start line. But I felt that I had come so far with my sport and was determined not to give up now … But I knew that an unjust decision had been made.”

Having taken podium positions in T53 races in the months leading up to the world championships, Wafula Strike finished second-last in her T54 200m heat. In the same competition Grey-Thompson competed in the T53 200m and won gold.

Grey-Thompson said that any questions about the process should be raised with the classifiers and that she had done what she could to help Wafula Strike. “She was not supported by several team coaches and I raised this on many occasions,” she said.

• This article was amended on 7 November 2017. An earlier version said evidence was yet to be published by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. This has been corrected to the DCMS select committee.