On June 16, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) published a damning report on state-sponsored doping among Russian Track and Field athletes.
On June 18, a month ago today, I published “Track Officials Ban Russians from Rio Olympics for Doping,” in which I argued that athletes in other sports had to be doping too.
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I suspect Track and Field athletes are being punished for the sins of Russian athletes in every other sport. After all, it beggars belief to think that Russia used systemic doping to enhance the performance of these athletes, but left those in every other sport to rely on their natural abilities…
Hence the spectre of saving national face, which the image-is-everything Putin is undoubtedly more interested in doing than saving any innocent athlete’s career. Except that he might have to order all Russian athletes to boycott the Rio Olympics to do so. Because bribing the IOC to overrule the IAAF would win him nothing but fool’s gold.
Stay tuned….
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Sure enough, now comes this:
Antidoping officials from at least 10 nations and 20 athlete groups are preparing the extraordinary step of requesting that the entire Russian delegation be barred from the Summer Olympics over allegations of a state-sponsored doping program…
The antidoping officials and athletes were expected to pressure Olympic leaders on the matter as soon as Monday — less than three weeks before the opening ceremony in Rio. They were waiting for the results of an investigation into claims published in The Times of a state-sponsored doping program conducted by Russian officials at the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
(New York Times, July 16, 2016)
As it happens, I presaged this corrupt state of sports in “In Putin’s Russia Even Athletics Is a Criminal (Doping) Enterprise,” November 9, 2015.
Russia led the republics of the old Soviet Union in boycotting the Olympics in 1984 for plainly political reasons. It would be quite ironic, and represent a historic fall from grace, if Russia were banned from the Olympics for purely ethical reasons today.
Except that, as I insinuated in my June 18 commentary above, Putin probably has each IOC member on videotape accepting millions in bribes to award Russia the Sochi Olympics. If so, it would amount to professional suicide for the IOC to defy/betray him in this spectacular fashion.
This is why I would be pleasantly shocked if it bans all athletes without offering some way for Putin’s Russia to save face.
Stay tuned….
Related commentaries:
Ban Russians…
In Putin’s Russia..