Doping must not tar beauty of sport
Sharapova scandal latest crushing blow in growing list of cheats
IDIOTS whose job it should be to demand clean sport are one problem. The tennis official who greeted news of Maria Sharapova’s failed drugs test by instancing her ‘great integrity’ is one extreme, the Russian apparatchik who raged against the evidence like a villain exposed by Scooby Doo is the other.
A second problem threatens to be us, sports lovers who are tempted to walk away at news of this fresh scandal.
Why keep believing? Because sport is supposed to represent the best of us.
This sounds laughable in a cynical time. But it is too easy to sneer, to slight rather than question, to tar rather than probe.
An extreme position, informed by the fatalistic view that the fight against doping is being lost, suggests legalisation could be the answer; let everyone dope, but in a regulated way.
This is nothing less than surrender. Not only is it morally indefensible to cave in to cheats, but it also assumes that anti-doping measures are not working because people are still using proscribed substances. But there will always be cheats, just as there will always be creeps snatching handbags and thugs kicking in doors to burgle homes.
That does not mean societies should give up on crime prevention and the idea of justice.
An even more mendacious argument equates doping to the advantages gained in sports by using legitimate technological advances. What is the essential difference between an athlete using an oxygen tent and using EPO?
One very obvious one is that the former does not cause the blood to thicken to sludge and carry the risk of death, as EPO is suspected of doing. Drugs have been prohibited for generations not only because they are performance enhancing but also because of the risks their use can pose to the health of athletes using them.
There is an argument against drugs on moral grounds, too. Moral- ity in sport can cause people to break out in a sweat, or roll their eyes at the simplistic notion of it. But an enduring attraction of sport is that, at its finest, it manifests the best of us.
People who work themselves to outstanding levels of fitness through hard training, careful diets and discipline deserve admiration but at the elite level this dedication is complemented by talent and the results can be marvellous to behold.
It is still worth caring about sport. The fight against cheats should be maintained if the reward is an AllIreland hurling final like the drawn edition in 2014, or a football match like Mayo against Dublin last year, or watching Maria McCambridge win the Dublin Marathon in 2013.
No ground should be conceded in the campaign against drugs. It is easy to lambast Lance Armstrong. Scepticism about Sharapova is understandable, and her explanation, as well as the sickly slick cynicism of its delivery at a press conference, deserves derision.
Anyone can be cynical about her or furious at Armstrong, but scandals closer to home have been treated with more equivocation in the past. A cheat is a cheat, no matter what flag they run under.
There were reservations expressed about the introduction of blood testing for Gaelic footballers and hurlers this year, but they should not be entertained, either. There is no price too high to pay to ensure clean participation.
Similarly, there was an unseemly rush to close down discussion of drugs in rugby in recent years. Some within the game moved with great haste to declare that it was not a problem for the sport, but then there is a large constituency in rugby who are not convinced that brain injury is a serious concern, either.
The line between believing in the inherent value of sport and naivety must be observed. Cycling faces a painful climb back towards credibility. And if we trust Irish athletes competing at the Rio Olympics next August, faith in the wider track and field spectacle is difficult to maintain.
Russ i a should be allowed nowhere near the Games, but the fear is that such a vast and historically powerful Olympic presence will be accommodated. It remains the view of many, this observer included, that athletics is just one major doping exposé away from a crisis of the kind that swamped cycling after the Lance Armstrong scandal finally broke.
If a superstar fails a test in Rio, the drama will adhere to a familiar script. Shock will be followed by anger, and then disgust will give way to hopelessness. Some will say the time has come to bring doping into the mainstream, recognising it the way we do energy drinks or vitamin supplements.
Others will say we should all just walk away and leave it to the cheats. That won’t stop the problem, though. The greed and cowardice and fear that make people cheat are not confined to certain sports.
No code is a haven. Drugs are a scourge that cannot be eliminated. They can, however, be resisted. That depends on properly resourced testing (with no funding from commercial interests), more investment in research but it also relies on people continuing to care.
Right and wrong can seem antiquated concepts in the world today, but in this instance they remain not merely relevant but vital.
This fight cannot be conceded.
‘MORALITY IN SPORT CAN CAUSE PEOPLE TO BREAK OUT IN A SWEAT’