Olive Loughnane is poised to have her silver medal in the 2009 world championships 20K racewalk upgraded to gold.

The Cork woman is set for retrospective recognition - and to become a world champion from five years ago - after the Russian anti-doping agency annulled the results of Olga Kaniskina, who beat Loughnane into second place at the Berlin games in August 2009. 

Fox Sports are reporting that the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) have provisionally suspended Russia's Kaniskina, gold medallist four-and-a-half-years ago, as part of an investigation into doping in Russian athletics. 

It had looked like Rob Heffernan was also about to gain a sensational Olympic medal after London 2012's 50K racewalk champion was provisionally suspended as part of the same doping violations, but it now appears unlikely that the Corkman will be rewarded.

Heffernan finished fourth in the Olympic race, but his hopes of being upgraded to bronze depend on the timeline of the provisional ban, which currently does not include the London Games.

The 36-year-old has form when it comes to retrospective rewards. Ireland's 2013 world champion won a bronze medal in the 2010 European Athletics Championships 20K two years on from the race after another Russian, Stanislav Emelyanov, was found to have committed an anti-doping violation. 

 

@OliveLoughnane welcome to the club ;)

— R & M Heffernan (@RM_Heffernan) January 20, 2015