Dopers Olympics plan is moronic, says Coe
SEBASTIAN Coe has described plans to hold an Olympic-style event for dopers as ‘b ****** s’ and warned any athlete ‘moronic’ enough to take part would face a long ban.
The ‘Enhanced Games’, where competitors would be permitted to take performance-enhancing drugs, were founded last year by London-based Australian businessman Aron D’Souza. The event is proposed to include athletics, swimming, weightlifting, gymnastics and combat sports, with big prize money on offer for athletes.
Although no date or venue has been set, Australia’s former world champion swimmer James Magnussen announced earlier this month that he would come out of retirement and ‘juice to the gills’ to try to break the 50metres freestyle record at the Games.
D’Souza also told Mail Sport last year that a British sprinter had expressed interest in the event.
But asked about the Enhanced Games concept, World Athletics president Coe said: ‘It’s b ****** s, isn’t it? I can’t really get excited about it. There’s only one message, and that is if anybody is moronic enough to officially take part in it and they are in the traditional part of our sport, they’ll get banned for a long time.
Speaking in Glasgow on the eve of the World Indoor Championships, Coe also doubled down on plans to reform the long jump by replacing the take-off board with a take-off zone.
Carl Lewis, four-time Olympic long jump champion, led the backlash against the idea, labelling it an ‘April Fool’s joke’ and saying it would ‘eliminate the most difficult skill from the event’.
Coe insisted: ‘We have a duty to make sure the sport moves ahead.’