2007 World Championships in Athletics
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| Host city | Osaka, Japan | ||
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| Nations participating | 200 | ||
| Athletes participating | 1,978 | ||
| Events | 47 | ||
| Opening ceremony | 24 August 2007 | ||
| Closing ceremony | 2 September 2007 | ||
| Main venue | Nagai Stadium | ||
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The 11th World Championships in Athletics, under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), were held at Nagai Stadium in Osaka, Japan from 24 August to 2 September 2007. 200 of the IAAF's 212 member federations entered a total of 1,978 athletes, the greatest number of competitors at any World Championships to date.Sarah Brightman, the world's best-selling soprano, performed her single Running at the opening ceremony.
Having bid unsuccessfully to host the 2008 Summer Olympics, Osaka was one of three cities to express an interest in hosting the 2007 World Championships alongside Budapest, Hungary and Berlin, Germany. By the IAAF's October 1, 2002 deadline, Budapest and Berlin had both withdrawn their bids, and Osaka was announced as the host city on November 15, 2002 as the sole remaining candidate. Berlin later bid successfully for the 2009 World Championships.
The IAAF stepped up its "war on doping" at the Osaka games, and for the first time, the number of drug tests exceeded 1,000. The IAAF lobbied the World Anti-Doping Agency to adopt stiffer penalties for first-time doping offences in WADA's code of practice. Before the Championships, former Olympic champion Ed Moses had voiced concerns about the extent of doping in the sport, and had even predicted that a medallist at the event would be found to have taken a banned substance. Despite these fears, the IAAF announced that only one of the samples taken over the course of the Championships was "suspicious" and required more examination. The governing body refused to elaborate further until more was known, but the French hurdler Naman Keïta admitted to having failed a drug test. The IAAF later confirmed that Keïta had tested positive for testosterone in an out-of-competition test at a training camp, and labelled the World Championships 'drug-free'.
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