DWAIN CHAMBERS may not be going to Beijing, but a host of other rehabilitated drug cheats will be piling onto planes to the Chinese capital. Across a broad spectrum of sports, there is controversy aplenty as sportsmen with drug bans in their portfoli
os will be lapping up the applause and harvesting medals in the games of the XXIX Olympiad.
Friday's High Court ruling upheld the British Olympic Association bylaw which prevents convicted dopers competing for Britain at the Games. Other countries are not so strict.
The most obvious candidate for attention from a British point of view is Ludmila Blonska of Ukraine who came back from suspension to clinch silver in the heptathlon in last summer's world championships and invoked the ire of Britain's Kelly Sotherton who finished behind her in bronze. Blonska was returning from what she referred to as "a problem with doping control" which made her "very fed up." The "problem" was she was taking industrial amounts of stanozolol, the steroid the infamous Ben Johnson tested positive for 20 years ago at the Seoul Olympics.
Other British competitors who will face former drug takers are the yachting pairing of Nick Rogers and Joe Glanfield who took silver at the last games. Israel's Udi Gal, who competes in the same 470-class as the British pair, has received nothing more than a reprimand from his federation for taking the performance enhancing drug, finesteride. He claims he took it in a preparation to prevent hair loss – his claim was accepted – but the drug is a favourite with the body-building fraternity and is often used to mask other steroid use.
The US athletics squad contains four athletes who have tested positive in the past, but are now cleared to run. Torri Edwards finished second in the 100m in the sudden-death American trials in 10.90sec. Given her current shape, she could well win two medals in the individual event and the sprint relay. Edwards tested positive for the stimulant niketamide. She missed Athens because of the ban, but had already won gold and silver at the 2003 Paris world championships.
Damu Cherry was second in the 100m hurdles in the trials and stands a good chance of a medal, despite missing the last Olympics while banned for using the steroid nandrolone. Triple jumper Kenta Bell is the third of the second-place finishers in the trials to have a doping past, but 800m winner Hazel Clark also needs to be added to the roster. She tested positive for pseudoephedrine back in 2001.
Swimming will also have its previously banned competitors back on the Olympic stage. The most high profile must be Tunisian Ossama Mellouli. A world short-course gold medallist, Mellouli tested positive in 2006 for amphetamines, but the Tunisian federation had let him off with a rap over the knuckles. When the international swimming federation learned of the aberration, however, they immediately slapped an 18-month ban on him.
One of the most blatant sports for doping must be weightlifting. Headlines were made recently when the whole of the Bulgarian squad of 11 were banned before they could get on the plane. Neighbouring Greece has had a similar rash of suspensions – 11 were banned recently for steroid abuse – so they won't be at the Olympics. But that will not stop the "pocket dynamo" Halil Mutlu of Turkey going for his fourth gold, despite returning recently from a two-year ban for taking steroids. Mutlu insists he never knowingly took the drugs.
American gymnastics is still reeling from the case in May of Morgan Hamm. The 25-year-old Hamm, who is the twin brother of reigning Olympic all-around gymnastics champion Paul Hamm, tested positive for triamcinolone acetonide. The drug is used as an anti-inflammatory medication by athletes and is prohibited under the rules of the International Gymnastics Federation and the USA doping agency.
Some athletes are permitted to use the drug if they and their doctor seek an exemption prior to the start of competition. Doping officials said Hamm had a prescription from a doctor to use the anti-inflammatory medication but failed to get a pre-competition exemption.
Finally, it is worth noting that, despite the setback for Chambers, there will be one British athlete in Beijing who overturned the BOA ban. Christine Ohuruogu missed three tests and that is equivalent to a failed drug test in the eyes of the International Association of Athletic Federations. After her one-year ban, she came back and won the world championships 400m in Osaka last summer and subsequently won her appeal against the BOA.
The full article contains 788 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
