Have drugs tainted the Olympics for ever?

THE proliferation of performance-improving drugs can be easily arrested, but the International Athletics Foundation is reluctant to look at the reason for the increase in drug use as it will highlight the part it has played in encouraging the practice. Young athletes can now become overnight celebrities and rich to a degree they once could only dream about. But track and field athletics used to be a real amateur sport: I recall being asked by a British board officer to declare that the value of a prize I competed for didn’t exceed the maximum allowed. We received the equivalent of $1 in local currency — not quite enough for a coffee in Helsinki. As a serving soldier, I took official leave to compete for GB in track and field, and European 400m champion John Wrighton did the same. I can’t think of any athlete then who considered themselves hard done by. Take the riches out of sport and put the fun back.

ERIC CLEAVER, Salisbury, Wilts.

AS SEBASTIAN COE has shown a total lack of backbone by letting the Russians compete in the Rio Olympics, would it be too much to hope that the competitors from other countries show their disapproval by letting the Russians win all events? Let the Russia’s runners run by themselves, let their swimmers swim alone in the pool. Their field eventers should be allowed to throw their javelins, put their shots and throw their discuses well apart from eventers from the rest of the world. The Russians should cycle, sail and row in isolation — the list is endless. If Russia’s athletes are allowed to compete, then all that the decent people of the world hold dear will stand for nothing.

TERRY WILTSHIRE, Tolworth, Surrey.

THE sure way to stamp out corruption in the Olympics would be to go back to what the ancient Greeks did by rewarding their winning athletes with a laurel wreath only.

DAVE OVERTON, Willoughby, Lincs.