Blimey, this may well find its way into the pit but let’s start here.
A German media expose last year pointed fingers at a systematic doping cover-up of athletes in Russia.
An investigation was commissioned and it is published today. The press conference is ongoing as we speak
This is explosive stuff. State-sponsored, intimidation, bribery. They ae recommending chucking Russia out of competition which means no Rio 2016.
Let’s hope the IOC and IAAF can show FIFA how action should be taken.
As a hardcore track and field fan, I am not surprised at all by this. The Telegraph has a quick synopsis of the report. Here are the key headings:
My thoughts on some of the points:
A nice threat, but I doubt that it will happen
No surprise here.
Former head Lamine Diack was arrested last week in France for taking bribes from the Russian federation to cover up positive tests. IAAF is small potatoes compared to FIFA, but is no less corrupt.
I could name a number of countries that I do not trust at all regarding doping. Greece, Turkey, and Belarus lead my list, in no particular order.
If they even consider banning Russia from the track and field events at Rio, then you know the calls are going to come for doing the same thing to USA athletes. Is there that much difference between “state-sponsored” and “BALCO-sponsored”? How many people believe (I do, BTW) that Marion Jones had no idea what “the clear” was? (Not that I am calling for her medals to be reinstated; on the contrary - I question CAS’s decision not to strip the other athletes on the relay teams she was on of their medals, although I am under the impression that their hands were tied.)
Besides, even if they do ban Russia, does the ban apply to all Russian athletes that end up competing for other countries? That might give Putin incentive to, er, “influence” a change in government in Ukraine to one that is willing to accept Russian athletes unconditionally, and the IOC buries its head in the sand when it comes to questions like, “Do these count as Ukraine medals or Russia medals?” (“What’s a medal count?”)
I think you’ve answered your own question. The USA state wasn’t involved in systematic doping and cover-up. Russia was (and is). There is a world of difference.
I suggest you read the report, or at least the relevant summary of it. This goes right to the top of Russian athletics. To the point that the Russian secret services are implicated in intimidation regarding Russian drug testing at Sochi.
That doesn’t happen without state sanction and when it goes that high and that deep I think you are in a different world to the BALCO scandal.
I think the Russian situation is different from the US situation. Nobody doubts that lots of American track and field people have and are using PEDs. The difference is that in the US, almost everyone is using a private coach and a private training facility. The Russian situation involves national coaches and officials in promoting and covering up doping.
Some instances:
–Back in about 2008, WADA got suspicious that the Russian out of competition testing was not missing anybody. Almost every country had a level of about 5% missed tests (the athlete is not available for whatever reason), but Russia had 0 missed tests. Upon looking further, they found that Russia was submitting the same sample for multiple athletes, that was clean. Seven women were banned for two years. BBC article from then indicating that the athletes knew that the testers were coming for a test.
–This article details the national team walks coach, Viktor Chegin, being banned, finally, by the Russian federation. He coached 20 walkers who were banned for drug violations, all while being the Russian national coach.
–Russian marathoner, Liliya Shobukhova, paid bribes to Russian officials to avoid a drug ban. I’m guessing some of that bribe money may have been forwarded to IAAF officials, including Lamine Diack, to keep it on the down low.
So Russian officials seem to warn athletes about out of competition testing, make sure the out of competition samples are clean, keeps a walks coach who has an entire stable of walkers testing positive, and accepts bribe money to cover up positive tests.
That is a little beyond what is currently being done in the US. As far as anybody knows.
Some basic information: in addition to the World Anti-Doping Agency, each IOC member nation is supposed to have its own anti-doping agencies and they are supposed to be independent.
The USA has USADA and while you can argue its effectiveness it is quite clear that it does not take its marching orders from Olympic sports federations, otherwise it would not have gone after Lance Armstrong, the single most powerful American in international sport. Olympic sprint relay coach Jon Drummond was a big part of the leadership in USA Track & Field and USADA took him down too, as they did with Olympic sprint champion Justin Gatlin. The USA has its share of problems in terms of PED use but USADA is not an enabler in this regard.
You can read the news articles that summarize the report or you can read the whole thing yourself, but the basic points are that Russia’s anti-doping agency was an enabler. It covered up positive tests, it destroyed evidence, it had a shadow lab, and on and on and on. In short, it was not compliant with the WADA code in any way, shape or form. The penalty is supposed to be a suspension from competition in international sport.
There’s more coming. Russia is far from the only violator, but it’s probably the only one that worked on a highly organized national level. For example, there could be serious problems in the USA, Kenya, and/or Jamaica, but it is not on a formal national level in the USA and basically nothing is “highly organized” about any aspect of life in Kenya or Jamaica, especially their athletic administrations.