Doping in Sports

[jerrym]

Yesterday's ongoing examples of Russian athletes doping to win is only a small part of the long history of cheating using drugs across numerous sports in virtually all countries.

Ten medalists from the 2008 Beijing Olympics, including 2012 high jump champion Anna Chicherova, were among 14 Russians that tested positive in the reanalysis of their doping samples, state television reported Tuesday.
Match TV said 11 of the 14 athletes on its retest list are from track and field, including 4x100-meter relay gold medallist Yulia Chermoshanskaya. The others are two weightlifters and a rower.
Separately, the Russian track federation said it would ban former dopers from the upcoming Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in the hope of getting its team reinstated for the games. The IAAF suspended the track federation from global competition after a World Anti-Doping Agency commission report detailed state-sponsored doping.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/sports/14-russ...sion-1.2915012

[jerrym]

The threat of banning Russia from the Rio Olympics is still hanging in the air.

The onetime director of Russia's anti-doping laboratory says he was part of a state-run doping program engineered to give Russian athletes a decisive edge at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Athletes were given a concoction of steroids stirred into quaffs of Chivas or vermouth. The program avoided detection with the help of Russian intelligence agents, who swapped athletes' urine samples tainted with performance-enhancing drugs with clean urine samples obtained from the athletes months earlier.…

At the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Russia ranked just sixth in the overall medal count — a humiliating result for a country immensely proud of its athletic prowess. Four years later when the world came to Sochi, Russia ranked first in the overall medal count.
The country's anti-doping director, Grigory Rodchenkov, blew the whistle on the program, but not before fleeing to Los Angeles. Predictably, the Kremlin's reaction has been defensive. A spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin said of the disclosure, "All this simply looks like slander by a turncoat."…

The allegations against Russia come just weeks after the World Anti-Doping Agencyaccused the country of being responsible for more violations than any other nation in 2014. Last November, doping allegations prompted the International Association of Athletics Federations, track and field's governing body, to provisionally suspend Russia from competition. The IAAF hasn't decided whether to reinstate Russia before the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.…
Between now and Rio, Russia may seek a reprieve with talk of sweeping reform, with pledges of winnowing out the bad apples. Don't be surprised by a Potemkin show of remorse aimed solely at keeping Moscow's visions of Rio glory alive.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/opini...517-story.html

[jerrym]

However, as the following Wikipedia article on sports doping notes, it started when sports started and continues today in football, baseball, hockey, cycling, weightlifting, and across many other sports.

Historically speaking, the origins of doping in sports go back to the very creation of sport itself. From ancient usage of substances in chariot racing to more recent controversies in baseball and cycling, popular views among athletes have varied widely from country to country over the years. The general trend among authorities and sporting organizations over the past several decades has been to strictly regulate the use of drugs in sport. The reasons for the ban are mainly the health risks of performance-enhancing drugs, the equality of opportunity for athletes, and the exemplary effect of drug-free sport for the public. Anti-doping authorities state that using performance-enhancing drugs goes against the "spirit of sport".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_in_sport

[jerrym]

The IOC is taking some measures to deal with drug cheating at the Olympics. Considering its past record, large questions remain about whether they will be effective and whether they will fully enforce them.

Olympic leaders took action on two fronts Wednesday, ramping up efforts to keep drug cheats out of the coming Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and recommending the inclusion of baseball/softball and four other sports for the 2020 Tokyo Games. The IOC executive board agreed to double its budget for pre-games drug testing to $500,000, to target athletes from Russia, Kenya and Mexico, and to extend retesting of stored doping samples to include medal winners from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics. “We want to make sure any targeted athletes who have a positive result will be stopped from competing in Rio,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams said. “That is for us the No. 1 priority.”

Meantime, the board backed the proposed inclusion of baseball/softball, surfing, karate, sports climbing and skateboarding for Tokyo. Under new IOC rules, local organizers can propose the inclusion of at least one additional sport for their games. ...

The International Olympic Committee also called a summit meeting of sports leaders for June 21 to “co-ordinate and harmonize” the approach on eligibility of athletes for the Rio Games. The meeting in Lausanne will come four days after the IAAF decides whether to uphold or lift its suspension of Russia’s entire track and field team in time for Rio. That sanction was imposed in November after a report by a World Anti-Doping Agency panel detailed state-sponsored doping, cheating and cover-ups in Russia.

“The discussion will have to address the difficult decision between collective responsibility and individual justice,” the IOC said. Some officials oppose a blanket ban on all Russian track athletes, or Russia’s entire Olympic team, saying it would punish some athletes who are clean and have never been accused of doping. Critics say evidence of state-backed doping should be enough to keep the Russians out of Rio.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sport...ticle30230763/