So I guess I am not the first person to add my comment on this subject!
Just google the words, "drugs in sport" and you'll find over 750,000 references, so where would you begin anyway?
The main question is, why would I even want to delve into this topic, when it's been beaten over the head more times than Igor the Queen Street bike thief has flipped used bikes...
(:
I guess it really started a few years ago, when I did some on-line writing for CBC Sports Online, over in Europe ahead of the Tour de France:
http://www.cbc.ca/sports/columns/tourdefrance/
I pursued the story believing that here was a true hero that surely must be accomplishing these amazing feats of endurance on pure talent alone. After speaking with some of the locals in England
Maybe Peter Fonseca was right, "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger"...
But let's rewind the tape a little...
When Ben Johnson won the Gold Medal in 1988, I and some friends ran around York University like fools, celebrating his victory (he trained indoors here all the time and we as students felt like he was one of us)...
Two days later we felt as angry and frustrated as everyone else, and the Olympic tarnish had begun. Despite this I would eventually find myself at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, how could I not see this sports spectacle for myself. Having completed 4 marathons already, I felt like I belonged, and proudly showed off my Canadian colours, revelling in the double-gold medal victory that Donovan Bailey brought home.
(I even tried to make money selling souvenir 100-meter
t-shirts back in Toronto
As I started paying attention to the marathon scene in earnest, I had started hearing the drug stories again, regarding certain distance athletes and whether or not they were "clean" or "dirty". Having now be-friended Peter Fonseca, Canada Atlanta Europe , with some of the best Italian, Portuguese and Spanish athletes, and he seemed to think that many of his slightly faster peers were indeed taking unfair advantages to gain that small edge.
At the same time, other major sports starting facing drug questions, so one had to wonder if there was anything or anyone pure left in sport?
Then of course when you start to ask questions, and poke your nose around, you can quickly become pretty disillusioned with professional athletes, even so-called "amateurs" like many Olympians. One of the reasons why I started to gravitate to these sports (running, cycling) was that I became dis-illusioned with the big-money salaries going towards the major sports stars - NHL, NFL, Baseball, NBA.
Yet, many of these athletes didn't seem to be great role models, and there always seemed to be a strike, a walk-out, a trade to another, higher-paying team, etc. I much preferred to spend my limited time supporting athletes who worked so hard and in many cases earned far less than the big-league, North American sports stars.
As an athlete and sports fan, whom would I root for, and where would my loyalties lie?
Fast-forward to recently, I have now become an avid cyclist, in no small part thanks to Lance Armstrong and the excellent t.v. coverage that followed his 7 Tour victories. Does it really matter that they are now catching these cheats on a regular basis?
Have they really done anything in the NBA, the NFL, the CFL, NHL or Major League Baseball?
Could you imagine the Stanley Cup Champions getting tested and then losing the trophy?
Would they really strip the awards and titles away from the top stars after-the-fact?
At least in the Tour, no one is safe and as we now know all too well, even the winners are caught, thrown out immediately and disgraced forever.
Makes me fell a little better, what about you?
PD
peter@mynextrace.com
