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True cheats don’t do it alone

Chris Harrison

by Chris Harrison

15 Feb 05:55am

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Filed under: Cheating, Competition, Drugs, Lance Armstrong, Sport

29 comments

While the world’s libraries are busy shifting Lance Armstrong’s autobiography from the non-fiction to the fiction shelf, I’m wondering into which genre the Australian Crime Commission’s report on the corruption of Australian sport will eventually fall.

Not the only one up to no good

Unless the darkest day in Australian sport is illuminated sometime soon, I’m worried it will be considered something of a docudrama based on a true story and we will be left wondering what was real and what wasn’t.

What has surprised me, given the gambling culture in this country, is that the plethora of betting agencies aren’t offering odds on which players, teams or matches will eventually be named and shamed.

Forgive the cynicism but there’s a lot of it going around at the moment, and it’s damaging Aussie sport almost as much as this reticent report. But I don’t want to talk about the ACC’s scattergun claims. Everyone else has written about them and by now you’ve formed an opinion on whether what you’re watching (or not watching) on Australian sports fields is real or rigged.

I just want to tell you why I wasn’t surprised when our national criminal intelligence and investigation agency said there is doping and corruption in Australian sport and why I watch all professional sport and the Olympics with a degree of scepticism. (Except when Geelong beat Collingwood in AFL Grand Finals. Then I am only too happy to suspend disbelief.)

An Australian sports magazine once sent me to Rome to interview Sandro Donati, then head of science and research at the Italian Olympic Committee. The former athletics coach had waged a one-man war on corruption in sport and, in doing so, sacrificed his country’s reputation in an attempt to reveal the global problem.

Donati is living proof of the role that coaches play in the doping of athletes. After his appointment as a national running coach his boss asked him what he was expecting from his chargers at the upcoming Los Angeles Games. Donati replied he was hopeful that a few of them would make the final. To which his boss allegedly replied: “The final? What is the final? People aren’t interested about an athlete in the final. People are interested in medals.”

Donati was briefed on how blood-doped athletes could take off 30-40 seconds over 10,000m, 15-20 seconds over 5000m and 3-5 seconds over 1500m.

In what might be considered a primitive doping practice in 2013, but which in the ‘80s was the cutting edge way to a winning edge, half a litre of blood was drawn from a promising athlete, from which the younger and stronger red blood cells were removed and refrigerated at -90°C.

A few days before competition, athletes received a transfusion of their reinvigorated blood which immediately boosted their red blood cell count, meaning resistance, endurance and results. The only compromise was to the athletes’ health (think cyclist Marco Pantani), which is why Donati spoke out.

Realising it futile to fight doping from within a corrupt system, in 1985 the conscientious objector approached the Italian parliament, where he managed to convince the Health Minister of the risks involved. The practice of blood transfusions became classified as doping and was outlawed in Italy. The International Olympic Committee promptly followed suit.

“Like all my victories it was a pyrrhic victory,” said Donati, describing success that comes at too great a cost to be of use. “I realised that the sports system had a great capacity for metamorphosis, and if it gets caught with its hands in the marmalade it either changes marmalade or hides it. Blood doping merely opened the road to EPO (think Lance Armstrong) because blood doping was a trial to understand the roll of EPO.”

Since then, Donati has had many other pyrrhic victories, the most famous of which cost him his job. At the 1987 World Athletics Championships in Rome, Donati proved that the field judges of the long jump had put the distances for hometown hero Giovanni Evangelisti into the computer BEFORE Evangelisti jumped, ensuring him a medal he was forced to hand back. The tragedy for the tainted athlete was that he had no idea of the fix.

What depressed me most about my interview with Donati was that he made me realise the will to cheat was greater than the will to catch cheats, and that the science of doping was more advanced than the science of anti-doping. Donati even found a drug testing laboratory that was helping athletes avoid detection rather than detecting them.

Cheats can only prosper in an environment that permits them to prosper. Lance Armstrong never failed a single drug test and didn’t work alone.

Though reluctant to burst, the current cloud in Australian sport brought about by the ACC’s report hovers over more than the athletes’ heads. The credibility of the entire sporting landscape is at stake: athletes coaches, scientists, support staff, administrators, betting agencies…

Let’s just hope if our hometown heroes do get caught with their hands in the marmalade that we don’t simply serve them up as scapegoats but we unmask the people behind the scenes who not only supplied that marmalade but who gave them the means and the incentive to spread it.

Will that ever happen while the financial rewards of sport are so ridiculously high, and while the pie is so appetising that everyone wants a slice?

I hope the ACC’s victory, if it becomes a victory, isn’t in vain like those of Sandro Donati.

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29 comments

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    • Fiddler says:

      05:18am | 15/02/13

      I for one am glad that there is no organised crime in this country which allows the ACC to investigate such things.

      Oh, wait…..

      Reply

    • gof says:

      06:40am | 15/02/13

      “Oh, wait…”,
      isn’t organised crime in this country just “Big business” propped up by NLP policy.

    • acotrel says:

      08:24am | 15/02/13

      There must be something about pushbike riders which makes them untrustworthy ?

    • michael j says:

      06:57am | 15/02/13

      Andrew Johns is proof there has been Drugs in the NRL for a long time ,
      and he was Rewarded, Where’ the problem now ?

      Reply

    • dweezy2176 says:

      07:59am | 15/02/13

      Good one, several times since this came out I have stated similar views on the NRL and none made it into print!

    • Tim says:

      08:16am | 15/02/13

      Because some people know the difference between performance enhancing and recreational drugs.

    • Ando says:

      10:16am | 15/02/13

      We dont need proof . There are 18-30 year olds in every profession who take drugs.

    • PW says:

      02:24pm | 15/02/13

      Tim

      Whether they enhanced his performance or not, the substances Johns took were not only illegal by the law, but prescribed as illegal by the game of Rugby League.

      Since the most basic test will detect esctasy, it is clear that Johns was never tested, and therefore might have made Lance Armstrong look like Mother Teresa for all we know.

      In full knowledge that Johns had admitted to abuse of illegal drugs, the game of Rugby League made him an “immortal” and he has been provided with a lucrative career commentating on Channel 9.

      I love Rugby League, but it deserves all it gets.

    • bigmuzz says:

      04:30pm | 15/02/13

      just because Joey was never caught doesn’t mean he was never tested. from memory he did most of his partying in the off-season, or after a drugs test took place (and therefore you know you probably won’t have another one for many months).

      but personally I think there’s a major difference between performance enhancing drugs and recreational drugs. sure, they are both illegal and carry the same suspension sentences, but recreational drugs are hardly going to improve your performance on the field… (OFF the field on the other hand…) raspberry

    • PW says:

      05:24pm | 15/02/13

      bigmuzz-

      I seem to remember talk of Joey hitting the disco biscuits while on a Kangaroo tour, I suppose thats what you mean by the off season…

      He thumbed his nose at the game of Rugby League, and they made him an Immortal for it. He really should be persona non grata. I’m a League man all my life, but its easy to see why the game is slowly losing ground to other codes.

    • Trevor says:

      07:06am | 15/02/13

      How good was it to see Gus Gould crying into his weet-bix last night?

      And that indignant oaf next to him…priceless!

      Reply

    • Ando says:

      10:18am | 15/02/13

      Gus was 100% correct (I never thought I’d say that)

    • Joseph Logan says:

      09:30am | 15/02/13

      Notice Marion Jones’ name has not been mentioned anywhere in dispatches. She was found to be a drug cheat, and had all medals and winning performances made null and void.  When Jason Clare told us how shocking were the results, and we would be disgusted? I was disgusted at how the Labor Government recklessly and with unashamed gender- bias presented this. On the ” goodies” side representing the Government and ACC and Asada, we’re two women. On the ” baddies” side, not a woman in sight, to represent all sport in Australia. All men, only. I know it would be human nature to say , ” gosh, a woman would not do that”, but female sprinter, Marion Jones did, whether we like it or not.

      Reply

    • marley says:

      09:48am | 15/02/13

      So far as I’m aware, Marion Jones doesn’t play in the AFL or the NRL.  Perhaps that’s why her name didn’t come up.  I don’t think Ben Johnson’s did, either.  There have been plenty of female drug cheats over the years, notably in the East German and Soviet teams.  There have been plenty of male cheats as well.  The point is that drugs are a problem.

      It’s just that, at the moment, I’m not aware of an evidence that drug-taking is a major problem in netball or women’s cricket whereas it clearly is an issue in at least two of the professional football codes.  There just aren’t many women playing at the elite level in those codes.

    • Pattem says:

      10:20am | 15/02/13

      @Marley, you stated: “There have been plenty of female drug cheats over the years, notably in the East German and Soviet teams”.

      Don’t forget the Chinese female swim team from years past!  These ‘girls’ had shoulders broader than the men.

    • I hate pies says:

      03:05pm | 15/02/13

      And Flo Jo

    • Robert S McCormick says:

      09:45am | 15/02/13

      So the Australian Sports Statue has feet of clay. It had to happen. Australian sports administrators, sports journalists & the athletes themselves have always been amongst the first to spew out their venom against anyone who has been caught using all those pills, potions, transfusions, intravenous, intramuscular injections, drugs: legal & Illegal, chemicals &, as has been widely reported in the media, avian, bovine, equine, ovine & porcine bodily fluids.
      For years ordinary members of the public have been questioning the “achievements” of Elite Sportspeople, our own & those from other countries.
      Our “sports” people have always held themselves up as being cleaner than clean. Now the truth is coming out.
      Did all those “Physically Gifted” people we have had shoved down our throats for years become that way Naturally or by using all those pills’n'potions - Legal & Illegal?
      Did all those athletes, male & female, with their “trim, taut, t’riffic” bodies get those bodies Naturally or with Pills’n'Potions - Legal & Illegal?
      Were all those records, “personal bests” achieved Naturally or as a direct result of those “Pills’n'Potions” - Legal & Illegal?
      The Dirt File has been opened and Australian Sport, in all it’s forms, will forever be “suspect”

      Reply

    • PG says:

      12:03pm | 15/02/13

      “Now the truth is coming out”

      What truth? We haven’t seen anything concrete yet, apart from some teams being named and then subsequently cleared. This has been a farce from the minute Lundy held her press conference. It is a political stunt. Looks to me like ASDA never wanted it handled this way, in my experience they have lot more integrity than this.

      Athletes already endure a massive intrusion on their privacy and I can only see it getting worse after this. How many of you would accept having to tell your employer your whereabouts months in advance and submit to random drug testing any day of the week, knowing that if you are not where you’ve told them you were going to be, you lose your job for 2yrs?

    • Sunray says:

      09:58am | 15/02/13

      The Clare and Lundy show looks like it is going to be another GreenLabor self inflicted wound, at the expense, sadly, of all Australian sport, this time.

      Reply

    • centurion48 says:

      10:28am | 15/02/13

      I am not convinced that sports’ fans care too much about the drugs side (recreational or performance) but would be totally pissed off if games are rigged.
      Both AFL and NRL have had heroes who indulged in recreational drug taking and I don’t think you would have to dig too deeply to find others, who are currently playing, elite sport - men and women - that enjoy the occasional recreational drug.
      On the other hand, if a game is not played to the best ability of every player on the field then fans are being ripped off. Organised crime might be involved, and probably someone from a bikie gang is selling drugs to somebody who plays sport for a living, but that is a long way from the insinuation that organised crime is a major influence on the outcome of games through either paying players off or enhancing their performance.
      Call me cynical but in an election year, the appearance of two politicians at a press conference is more about politics than sport. Mr Plod just got over-excited when the pollies showed an interest because they could see the political mileage.

      Reply

    • Upnorff says:

      10:30am | 15/02/13

      Seriously, this is parallel to the ‘War on Drugs’ in that it cannot be won while the stakes are what they are. IMHO, drop the rules. Let slip the dogs. High end competitors aren’t representative of the species any more so why not go the whole hog? If there is money in it and it is legal the advances in medicine and probably cybernetics would be well worth the spectacle.

      Reply

    • Audra Blue says:

      03:46pm | 15/02/13

      If athletes started enhancing their bodies with cybernetics, I would definitely become a sport spectator!

    • Pattem says:

      10:35am | 15/02/13

      I saw the 7.30 interview with Stephen Dank where he alleged that the Essendon players knew exactly what they were doing by the fact they had signed a waiver.

      My question is:

      To what extent are the players signing these documents knowing and or understanding the full legalities and side-effects and therefore the ramifications of what is being injected into them?

      If the players are being told, “No, no this is legal” and “No, no there are little or no side-effects”, then they are having the wool pulled over their eyes.  If they are being told anything short of the absolute truth about these issues, then they are little more than guinea pigs who will become scapegoats.

      Reply

    • Chillin says:

      11:32am | 15/02/13

      They are footballers. (for a reason)

    • Rose says:

      03:16pm | 15/02/13

      What would the ramifications be if they didn’t sign and didn’t take the ‘supplements’ ? If not going along with the team programme meant an end to their career at the club, possibly even their career, what kind of choice did they really have?

    • Pattem says:

      04:08pm | 15/02/13

      @Rose

      Exactly!  +1

      The PsTB would get fellow players to put peer pressure on the non-conformist player (are you a team player or not $%!?), re drugs or for any other matter.  So yeah, absolutely agree…what kind of choice do they really have?

      Player’s agents - interest in the bottom line, not the well-being of their product, so would probably encourage the player to go along with the culture.

      A player who wanted to be ‘drug free’ and ‘clean’ would probably leave the sport and become a martyr - never to play the sport again!

    • stephen says:

      04:50pm | 15/02/13

      Drugs are everywhere.
      They are in homes all across this country, and most people, though they would not partake of the stuff themselves, see nothing wrong if the addicted ingest privately.
      If they are so common in the street, then why is everyone surprized that sportspeople take the stuff ?
      And I am not talking about the recreational drugs, but the drugs that are taken to gain an unfair advantage.

      So forget about the weekend sniffer, who we all know, but, we would say, would never think that he/she would cheat at a game.

      But taking illegal substances is illegal, and it is an affront to sense.
      Of course Lance Armstrong is wrong, and so is any drug cheat in sport ... but so is anyone else who takes the stuff.

      Reply

    • Pattem says:

      05:26pm | 15/02/13

      @Stephen

      Recreational drugs in widespread use across the public arena is NOT relatable to Perfomance Enhancing Drugs in sport.

      Recreational users of drugs are not cheats as you suggest otherwise in your final sentence: “Of course Lance Armstrong is wrong, and so is any drug cheat in sport ... but so is anyone else who takes the stuff”.

      Not sure whether you simply have used poor grammar to express your sentiment, or whether you don’t have the right distinction.

      The issues are:

      Performance Enhancing Drugs in Sport
      Recreational Drugs in Sport
      Recreational Drugs in the Public Arena
      Performance Enhancing Drugs in the Public Arena (for what?)

      Which one of these are you actually trying to discuss?

      Try again!

 
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