Dates are emerging for CAS hearings involving Russian athletes ©Getty Images

Russian athletes facing Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) hearings next week will be heard in two separate groups between Monday (January 22) and either Friday or Saturday (January 26 to 27), it has been announced today.

A date for a final award has not yet been confirmed but is likely to be between January 29 and February 2.

Hearings will not take place in Lausanne but at the International Conference Centre of Geneva.

The first group of 28 athletes will be heard by a three-strong legal panel composed of Germany's Christophe Vedder and Dirk-Reiner Martens, as well as Hamid Gharavi of France.

Vedder and Martens will also be involved in the second panel of 11 athletes.

Vedder has been named as President of both panels.

The Germans will be joined by Austria's Michael Geistlinger.

Geistlinger spent 16 years at the International Biathlon Union, including in the position of secretary general between 2004 and 2008, and now serves as legal advisor for the International Skating Union.

He is also an expert in topics including Russian constitutional law. 

Gharavi appears to be less experienced in sporting legal matters but has acted as arbitrator or counsel in more than 150 commercial ad-hoc and institutional arbitrations.

Appealing Russian athletes have been split into three different groups ©CAS
Appealing Russian athletes have been split into three different groups ©CAS

In total, 42 of the 43 Russian athletes to have been disqualified from the 2014 Olympics in Sochi for doping and banned from future Olympic Games for life have appealed to CAS.

Only 39 cases will be heard next week, however. 

Cases involving biathletes Olga Zaytseva, Olga Vilukhina and Yana Romanova have been "suspended".

There has been no reason given but insidethegames understands that they have a different legal team from the others.

It is not completely clear why the other athletes have been split.

Both Grigory Rodchenkov, the former Moscow Laboratory director and the main witness in allegations against the athletes, and Richard McLaren, head of a World Anti-Doping Agency-commissioned investigation, are expected to testify via video or telephone link.

Bobsleigh's Maxim Belugin is the one Russian athlete not to have appealed following his disqualification.

He is believed to have produced a positive test result following reanalysis of his samples.

The International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation have confirmed that, unlike the other Russian sliders implicated, he is currently suspended from competition.

All of the Russians involved were sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee for their alleged involvement in doping and sample tampering at their home Games.