Rana Reider, the coach of the sprinters Marcell Jacobs and Andre De Grasse at these Olympic Games, has had his accreditation withdrawn amid safeguarding concerns and allegations of sexual and emotional abuse.
Multiple sources have told the Guardian that Reider had his “P” accreditation, which allows persons who are considered essential for athlete preparation for the Olympics to access training and competition venues, withdrawn with immediate effect on Monday afternoon.
Reider’s lawyer Ryan Stevens later confirmed that Canada’s Olympic committee had told him it would be sending an official letter confirming the withdrawal of the accreditation.
In a statement, Stevens hit out at what he described as a failure to give Reider due process, alleged one of the complainants was acting maliciously, and feared for the performances of the athletes he was still due to coach.
On Friday World Athletics had questioned Canada’s decision to accredit Reider when he had only recently served a 12‑month probation after he admitted to being sanctioned by US SafeSport for a relationship that “presented a power imbalance” with one of his athletes – but said it could do nothing about it.
On Sunday the Times then reported that three women, one of whom is anonymous, had filed lawsuits against Reider to a circuit court in Broward County, Florida. The newspaper said one of the athletes, who is named in the court documents, had accused Reider of sexual and emotional abuse. Another athlete, who the Times said had also been named in court documents, also accused Reider of sexual and verbal harassment.
The Times reported that USA Track & Field had issued an indefinite safety plan for Reider as a coach. Stevens confirmed to the Times that Reider was being represented by Florida counsel in the state lawsuits.
Following the subsequent withdrawal of accreditation, a statement from the lawyer said Reider had been “unjustly stripped of his Olympic coaching credential, based on years‑old claims in a lawsuit by former athletes seeking financial gain”. It went on to say there were no sanctions currently against him by the US Center for SafeSport or USA Track & Field or Athletics Canada and that there had been no formal investigation of the new allegations that supported the withdrawal of his credential.
“It’s a bad day for the Olympics when a governing body’s fear of bad publicity is prioritised over the athletes,” Stevens said. Stevens confirmed that “Coach Reider has no pending sanctions against him by any governing body”.
“The ones who are being hurt in all of this are the athletes suddenly forced to compete without their chosen coach, including one of Canada’s finest sprinters,” Stevens said.
Reider, who guided the Canadian De Grasse to the Olympic 200m title and also now coaches Jacobs, Italy’s Tokyo 100m champion, is regarded as one of the best sprint coaches in the world. However he was denied accreditation to the 2022 and 2023 World Athletics Championships. In 2022 he was also cautioned by police after gaining unauthorised access to the athlete warm-up area before the world 100m final.
The Guardian first broke the story of the US Safesport investigation into Reider over sexual misconduct claims in November 2021, after which it was reported he had an alleged affair with a British athlete 26 years his junior when he was UK Athletics sprints and relays lead. It led to his 12-month probation.
UKA also later confirmed it had conducted an internal investigation into Reider in 2014 and that its contract with the coach was terminated “soon after”. It also said that an inquiry now would be handled differently.
