World in Sport

Doping positives cast shadow over Games

A thing worth having is a thing worth cheating for, says economist Steven D. Levitt in his bestselling book, Freakonomics, which unveils cheating as common practice, from time-honored sumo contests in Japan, to modern day baseball in the United States.

And it is certainly not an exception at the world's most prestigious sports event, the Olympic Games.
Although the International Olympic Council (IOC) pledged to make the Beijing Games a "clean" one, positive doping results from five athletes so far -- the latest being Ukrainian heptathlon silver medalist Liudmyla Blonska -- have cast a shadow over the quadrennial event yet again. Blonska was tested positive for banned substances on Wednesday.
The IOC's disciplinary commission was due to hold a press conference on Thursday to discuss possible sanctions against Blonska. As of press time, no details were available.
Blonska finished second in the women's heptathlon last weekend, behind compatriot Natalya Dobrynska. The 29-year-old, who served a doping suspension between 2003 and 2005, could face a lifetime ban if the IOC rules she committed a second offense, in addition to being stripped of her medal.
She is the fifth athlete to test positive for banned substances at the Games, following Spanish cyclist Isabel Moreno, Korean sharpshooter Kim Jong Su, Vietnamese gymnast Do Thi Ngan Thuong and Greek Olympic champion hurdler Fani Halkia.
This is the 86th doping case in Olympics history since the IOC introduced doping tests in the 1968 Mexico Olympics.
Doping, or taking performance enhancing substances, severely undermines the credibility of the Games, which is supposed to place sportsmanship as the highest value.
"We have to restore faith in the events, otherwise we are morally bankrupt and saying to our kids 'Fill yourselves up with a mouthful of pills if you want to succeed'," World Anti-Doping Association chief John Fahey said earlier in Beijing.
"I don't want my grandchildren to succeed in sports by taking something not natural and not healthy."
Fahey admitted it would be na*ve to expect there would be no doping during the Games.
"But we can be sure through all the progress in the past four years, cheating stands a greater chance of being caught," he asserted.
The IOC will conduct 4,500 tests throughout the duration of the Games, a 25 percent increase from the 3,600 tests in Athens, where 26 doping cases were reported.
It also calls for harsher punishments for offenders, including an extension of a two-year ban for first-time offenders to four years.
Such efforts led to large scale pre-Games tests in many countries looking to ensure athletes guilty of cheating would not go to Beijing.
Eleven members of the Greek national team tested positive in March for the anabolic steroid methyltrienolone. Late last month, seven top Russian female track-and-field athletes were suspended by the International Association of Athletics Federations after being accused of manipulating their urine samples. The Bulgarian weightlifting association also dropped its 11 top weightlifters from its Games squad after they tested positive.
Mustapha Larfaoui, president of aquatic sports' governing body FINA, warned during a recent interview it would be an uphill task to rid the Games of cheaters and doping offenders.
"This is a war we will win," he said. "Cheaters will always be there. But it is our task to make very little space for them to do that.