[4] In January 2020, the United States Center for SafeSport placed Salazar on its temporarily banned list while it investigated allegations against him involving sexual and emotional misconduct.

SafeSport permanently banned him a year and a half later, in July 2021, after it found that he had committed four violations involving emotional and sexual misconduct.

[5][6][7] In December 2021, Salazar appealed the ban in arbitration but lost, making him permanently ineligible for any activity held by the USOPC or any sport's USOPC-recognized National Governing Body.

[9] His father Jose was a close friend of Fidel Castro and a revolutionary, who then became an opponent of the totalitarian communist regime and member of the anti-Castro movement.

He trained with the well-known Greater Boston Track Club (whose members included the likes of Bill Rodgers, Randy Thomas, and Greg Meyer), where he was given the nickname of "the rookie".

Salazar enjoyed success in cross country competition, earning several All-American honors in collegiate and post-collegiate national championships.

He was also the 10,000-meter national track champion in 1983, pulling away from Craig Virgin in the last straightaway at the U.S. championships in Indiana in June to win his second such title (the first coming in 1981).

Salazar's competitive decline is often attributed to the stress on his body from that memorable Duel in the Sun detailed in the eponymous book by John Brant.

This intense and grueling regimen of such extremely long distances led to a breakdown of his immune system, and he found himself frequently sick, injured, and otherwise unable to continue training.

"[10] A doctor diagnosed Salazar's running problems and exercise-induced asthma as largely due to the 1982 marathon, and successfully prescribed Prozac to improve his depression and physical symptoms.

After Salazar closed the restaurant he owned, he began training again at the age of 34 and in 1994 won the prestigious 90 km (56 mi) Comrades Marathon.

[10] Salazar stated that the medication played a role in motivating him to succeed again in professional running though the actual effect of the drug on his performance remains controversial.

[19] While Decker and her lawyers contended that the T/E ratio test is unreliable for women in their late 30s who are taking birth control pills, she was eliminated in the heats at the Olympics.

In April 1999, the arbitration panel ruled against her, after which the IAAF through a retroactive ban stripped her of a silver medal she had won in the 1500 meters at the 1997 World Indoor Championships.

The book tracks Salazar's story from his family's roots in Cuba, his adolescence in Massachusetts, through his running career to present-day coaching efforts, culminating in his 14-minute-long heart stop in 2007.

Salazar declined to be interviewed for the programme, but denied any wrongdoing, saying in a statement that the "allegations your sources are making are based upon false assumptions and half-truths in an attempt to further their personal agendas".

[30] One of the more high-profile allegations was made by former Nike Oregon Project athlete Kara Goucher, who claimed she was pressured by Salazar to take thyroid medication not prescribed by her doctor to lose weight gained during her pregnancy in 2010.

[32][33] On October 1, 2019, United States Anti-Doping Agency USADA banned Salazar and Dr. Jeffrey Stuart Brown,[34][35] a colleague at the Nike Oregon Project, for doping offences.

In response, Salazar stated that "Throughout this six-year investigation my athletes and I have endured unjust, unethical and highly damaging treatment from USADA.

The CAS stated that he was found guilty of "possessing testosterone, complicity in Brown's administration of a prohibited method, and tampering with the doping control process."

[40][8][41] On July 26, 2021, Salazar was deemed "permanently ineligible" by SafeSport, after it found that he had committed four violations of emotional and sexual misconduct, including two instances of his penetrating a runner with his finger while giving an athletic massage.

[5] As a result Salazar was effectively banned for life from participating in any activity put on by or under the auspices of the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee or any sport's USOPC-recognized National Governing Body.