Olympics - Doping - your thoughts

[autumngems]

Russia at center of another Olympic doping controversy

At the 2014 Olympics, Russia ran a sophisticated operation to cover up performance-enhancing drug use. Now, eight years later, it appears they may be following the same script.

sports.yahoo.com

Myself, I believe they should be eliminated. All countries know what drugs are banned and what their athletes use so there is no excuse. I don't care what the age is, they still knew so age doesn't matter.

 

[musicloveranthony]

It makes me sad that steroids and other supplements are almost to be expected in competition athletics. These athletes are so young. THey have so much to lose and it's often before even being fully developed adults.

 

[telephone89]

Russia can't even compete under their own name and flag because of doping. Obviously they didn't learn their lesson. There has been 0 remorse or acknowledgement of wrongdoing on their part at all. They should have not been allowed to compete at the last 2 olympics at all IMO.

edit: I also want to add that I watched her historic performance and was SO amazed. This honestly broke my heart a bit to hear. Her performance will either be struck from the record or be forever historic* with a giant caveat. Really sad for the sport and the olympics overall IMO.

 

[Kim N]

edit: I also want to add that I watched her historic performance and was SO amazed. This honestly broke my heart a bit to hear.

Yes, me too.

 

[Beagles]

The Russian skater is 15. It's child abuse by her coach, who apparently rules all of Russian ice skating. Reminds me way too much of the systemic sexual abuse the US gymnasts were subjected to for many years and how so many adults who should have been protecting them turned a blind eye to it because the team was winning.

 

[Matata]

It's child abuse

Doping is a small but significant part of it. Imo, all athletic training engaged in by wanna be elite athletes is abuse. They give up their social lives and devote the majority of their waking hours to training, extreme nutrition programs, and exercise regimens that complement their sport-specific training. It starts when they're little and continues until they retire. In the US, parents give enormous amounts of time, attention, and finances for the wanna be elite athlete oft times to the detriment of siblings. We like to call it "sacrifice" to make it seem noble but it is nothing more than grooming a human to be prime beef in the world of amateur and professional athletics. I worked for years in the system and saw first hand what is done to create the elite athlete and it isn't pretty.

 

[jp201845]

I remember back in the day when it wasn't as common and Ben Johnson broke the world record and was the fastest man only to be stripped of his title days later for getting caught for using steroids. What a Rollercoaster that would have been for him. I believe this was back in the 90"s and he was one of the first ones to get caught...was a huge story at the time and he was Canadian.

Edit: He won the gold in 1988

 

[autumngems]

Russia can't even compete under their own name and flag because of doping. Obviously they didn't learn their lesson. There has been 0 remorse or acknowledgement of wrongdoing on their part at all. They should have not been allowed to compete at the last 2 olympics at all IMO.

edit: I also want to add that I watched her historic performance and was SO amazed. This honestly broke my heart a bit to hear. Her performance will either be struck from the record or be forever historic* with a giant caveat. Really sad for the sport and the olympics overall IMO.

Yes, when I heard there was a member on the team, I really never even considered it would be her.

 

[autumngems]

Doping is a small but significant part of it. Imo, all athletic training engaged in by wanna be elite athletes is abuse. They give up their social lives and devote the majority of their waking hours to training, extreme nutrition programs, and exercise regimens that complement their sport-specific training. It starts when they're little and continues until they retire. In the US, parents give enormous amounts of time, attention, and finances for the wanna be elite athlete oft times to the detriment of siblings. We like to call it "sacrifice" to make it seem noble but it is nothing more than grooming a human to be prime beef in the world of amateur and professional athletics. I worked for years in the system and saw first hand what is done to create the elite athlete and it isn't pretty.

I saw in this Olympics there were several sibling competing, I can't imagine 2 in a family with all that regimens they go through.

 

[autumngems]

She is supposed to compete in the women's individual on the 15th, I think they should be eliminated now. Why let them compete then strip the medal later?

 

[Snowdrop13]

I watched her routines earlier in the week and was blown away by her skill and fluidity, hearing this today makes me very sad. She is a child, for goodness sake!! What are they doing, feeding her drugs secretly in her breakfast? It’s terrible.

 

[ItsMainelyYou]

I watched her routines earlier in the week and was blown away by her skill and fluidity, hearing this today makes me very sad. She is a child, for goodness sake!! What are they doing, feeding her drugs secretly in her breakfast? It’s terrible.

Her quad isn't possible without enhancing drugs- it's why two prepubescent Russian girls can do those quads and nobody else can. Women's bodies don't allow for it. She wasn't given a choice.
Yes, they've been doping all their athletes, as well as giving them puberty suppressing drugs among other things- they've been banned from the last three Olympics because of it. They systematically swapped 'dirty' urine samples for 'clean'. It's a state wide thing. Russia knew she would fail and had her compete anyway. They also know what they're giving to these very young girls will permanently destroy their bodies. They don't care.
It's evil.
The IOC allowed this to happen.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/2022/02/10/russian-figure-skating-doping-allegations/

Why Are Russians in Beijing if Russia Is Banned for Doping?

A figure skating crisis raises new questions about the participation of Russian athletes while their country is banned from global sports after a doping scandal.

www.nytimes.com

The Russian women’s figure skating team has bigger problems than doping

Kamila Valieva and Russia’s women’s figure skating team are incredibly dominant. The team is also incredibly controversial.

www.vox.com

 

[adlgel]

She truly has such exquisite lines with such beautiful extension on all her moves.

I think the nature of sport is that athletes and the people watching them want them to keep pushing the envelope - there are now talks of quint jumps for men becoming a reality. We see it in all sports. The question is how to support them doing that in ways that don't create long-term damage to the athlete. And certainly doping a 15 year old girl is not the way to do that.

 

[autumngems]

Well, they are letting the Russian girl compete despite doping. It's very disappointing, I quit watching the Olympics. I've lost all respect.

 

[adlgel]

I too was very surprised at the decision to allow her to compete. I understand that she is a minor but I don't think that is sufficient reason to allow her to continue to compete. And the only "punishment" is that there won't be a medal ceremony if she wins? I guess that is the only punishment the IOC feels they have the power to enact at this point (my understanding is that they wanted her disqualified from competition). But what a slap in the face to the other two medalists who lose out on that experience because they can't instill an appropriate punishment for the Russian team for doping. It's a bit of a travesty to be honest, but then again the whole approach to dealing with the Russian systemic doping has been a bit of a travesty.

 

[autumngems]

If she medals at all they said there will be no medal ceremony. So now if she wins 1-3, whoever else wins the other medals does not to get to have a medal ceremony. So we punish everyone for Russia's cheating? Great idea, NOT!

They have tainted the Olympics for everyone now. It won't be officially settled for months (whether they lose their wins) if they do end up taking the medals afterwards, then other skaters have lost that opportunity to be recognized publicly at the event as real winners.

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

I blame her handlers
She is only 15
but her reputation is ruined for ever

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

If she medals at all they said there will be no medal ceremony. So now if she wins 1-3, whoever else wins the other medals does not to get to have a medal ceremony. So we punish everyone for Russia's cheating? Great idea, NOT!

They have tainted the Olympics for everyone now. It won't be officially settled for months (whether they lose their wins) if they do end up taking the medals afterwards, then other skaters have lost that opportunity to be recognized publicly at the event as real winners.

In the summer Olympics recently (or maybe the one before) we had an athlete promoted to gold well after the event
It was due to doping and yes, it was from the same part of the world

A nightly current events tv show gave her a 'medal ceremony' some time after the fact and back home in NZ

But it was all frightfully unfair to the lass who was promoted to bronze (i forget where she was from)
She completly lost out to her moment on an Olympic dias

 

[telephone89]

Also thinking back to the summer games, Sha'Carri Richardson was DQd for THC in her drug test and was not allowed to compete in the olympics at all. THC is not even a performance enhancer and they treated her much harsher than this Russian girl.

It's outrageous that she is still allowed to compete IMO.

 

[TooPatient]

One of the reasons DH and I won't watch any of the big competitions anymore. The treatment of the athletes and the heavy use of drugs is just too much for us to ignore. I can't bring myself to watch and give support to that.

 

[adlgel]

@telephone89 I wonder if the distinction is that Kamila is a minor and Sha'Carri was not at the time of her infraction.

 

[MrsBlue]

Also thinking back to the summer games, Sha'Carri Richardson was DQd for THC in her drug test and was not allowed to compete in the olympics at all. THC is not even a performance enhancer and they treated her much harsher than this Russian girl.

It's outrageous that she is still allowed to compete IMO.

She will be allowed to wow the crowd with her impossible jumps while the true medalists who follow the rules get a fraction of the experience they're entitled to?

How sad for the sport and how unfair for honest competitors.

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

the whole thing stinks

 

[autumngems]

Her sample was taken at Russian nationals in Dec (which they use to qualify for the Olympics) so she should not have been on the team to begin with if she was positive then.
At first they said it was a drug used for her angina now they say it was her grandfather's drug and somehow she got contaminated from him. Ok, so half-life of the drug is 8 hours, she must have been swapping spit with her grandpa to be positive at that point. The lies they will tell to try to make it ok is astounding!

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

In answer to the thread title
One word sums it up

cheating

 

[Petalouda]

I’m a HUGE figure skating fan but can’t bring myself to watch this competition after this. I’ll watch the deserving skaters later on once my emotions have calmed down. This is so incredibly unfair to the other skaters and sets a harmful precedent for sure.

 

[kenny]

IMO it is naive to think of sports today as pure ... IOW naked human bodies competing as the Greeks did long ago.
The results then were 100% dependent on what a human mind and body itslef could do with no help from all the helping stuff used today.

Olympics: They Used to Compete in the Nude

Ann Beveridge, in the Daily Telegraph (Sydney, Australia) (Aug. 16, 2004):If the modern Olympic Games ran true to the strict customs of ancient Greece they might well today have been called the "Naked Games". From the early 8th century BC, Olympic athletes competed in the nude.There are...

historynewsnetwork.org

Better and better technology certainly helps an individual athlete win.
There are running shoes that help runners run faster.
You can swim faster with a high-tech suit that lowers the friction between water and human skin.

But then, is it the human who deserves the gold, or the technology?
Of course it's a combination of both.

So why are drugs any different than any other performance-enhancing technology?
Drugs are just another technology, all of which could be banned to make competition more fair.

Of course it won't help the doping thing, but let's go back to naked athletes.
Such are my thoughts on doping.

 

[Matata]

But then, is it the human who won, or the technology?
Of course it's the combination of both.

Nope. It's the tech. If an athlete runs faster, jumps higher, swims faster using the tech than without the tech, it's the tech. There's no money in natural athletes anymore and I have no interest in the artificial ones. I agree -- bring back naked competition.

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

I feel sorry for the silver medal winning US team
not sure if due to covid there are moms and dads at this Olympics but its greatly unfare to all the early morning starts and other sacrifices families have to make for years and years for these athlete to not get to see their sons and daughters, brothers and sisters up in the Olympic podium
Even a silver or bronze medal is the pinnacle of a career
And what about the girls who came 4th .....waiting waiting
They quite likely will have deserved to win the broonz

 

[kenny]

...
And what about the girls who came 4th .....waiting waiting
They quite likely will have deserved to win the broonz

They need to introduce the aluminum metal for 4th ... maybe plastic for 5th.