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The Botswana runner is set to sell the country’s first Olympics medal to cushion his family after he was handed a three-year suspension by AIU
Botswana’s former Olympic 800m silver medalist Nijel Amos, who was last week handed a three-year doping ban, plans to sell that very medal to survive as he begins to feel the full impact of the suspension.
Amos, who took silver at the 2012 London Games, in what many called the greatest Olympic race in history when Kenyan David Rudisha lowered his world record, was suspended after he tested positive for the banned substance GW1516, with his ban starting in July 2022.
Now, the 29-year-old says the whole process has taken its toll on his finances and has left him with no choice but to sell his Olympic medal, the first medal in Botswana’s Olympic history.
"It has been a financially draining process," Amos said at a news conference in Botswana, as reported by the BBC, where he also spoke of "the effort to clear my name and that of my beloved nation, Botswana, in the past daunting 11 months".
"At this time, my only investment or pension is the famous 2012 Olympic silver medal. I am in touch with different stakeholders, including financial advisors, on how that can sustain me and my family.
"I met with a team that wants to buy it with a value of 4.5 million Botswana pula (Ksh41m), but with my documentary coming out on Netflix it could change the value to 7.5 million.
"It is extremely difficult to survive as an athlete in Botswana, where we are not given pensions or any lump sum insurance payouts."
Amos matched Seb Coe, now World Athletics president, as the third-fastest man in history in the event (1:41.73) 11 years ago. Every runner’s time was the fastest ever for that finishing placement.
He escaped a longer four-year suspension, having admitted to the offence, adding to the fact that this is his first doping offence but he has since apologised to his country for embarrassing them.
"I am very much aware that the ruling made by (Athletics Integrity Unit) AIU brings shame to the nation," he added.
"I would like to humbly apologise to my beloved country, its citizens, fellow athletes, and athletic bodies in the country.
"However, I am of the belief that if I had support from my native sports bodies, we would be facing a different outcome."
Amos was provisionally suspended in July 2022 after failing the drug test during an out-of-competition test a month earlier, after a lab analysed the sample and notified the AIU.
He consequently missed last year’s World Championships in Eugene as he awaited his fate and will now have to wait until at least August 2025 to compete.
"I have no plans to retire," he said. "I am still in good shape and I am hopeful that I will rise again in the World Championships in 2025.”
"I know not everyone is going to be happy, but my fellow athletes reached out - almost 75 percent of them - letting me know they are with me on the journey and they are waiting for me to come back.
"I have to understand that I am no longer doing it to be the best athlete in the world - I am coming out there to clear my name."
Amos has not won an Olympic or world championship medal since his silver in 2012 but had been a thorn in the flesh for Rudisha since they battled in London. In July 2019, he ran 1:41.89, the world’s best time since that London Olympic final.
At the Tokyo Olympics, Amos and American Isaiah Jewett got tangled in the final lap of their semi-final. In an act of good sportsmanship, the runners helped each other up and later jogged across the finish line together in the last two places. Amos was granted a place in the final but finished eighth.
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