Russia is making a mockery of international sport.
Consider what would happen to an Australian coach if his charges returned nearly 30 positive drug tests over a period of a few years.
Chances are such a thing would never get to that stage as Athletics Australia would step in and remove his accreditation before the numbers surged to that ridiculous level.
Remarkably, in Russia that was not the case.
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The penny eventually dropped for the country’s athletics officials in March last year when they finally handed the national race walking coach, Viktor Chegin, a lifetime ban from the sport.
Unfortunately, by that stage he had produced several world and Olympic champions and sundry minor medallists.
Among Chegin’s squad of drug-tainted walkers was Sergey Kiryapkin, who ‘won’ the 50-kilometre event in London and two world championships.
Australia’s Jared Tallent, who crossed the line second behind Kiryapkin four years ago at the London Olympics, has been rightly upgraded to the gold medal.
Tallent’s story of initial denial on the world’s biggest sporting stage is just one of many as a result of wholesale Russian cheating.
In August 2013, Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko trumpeted the opening of the Federal State Unitary Enterprise Anti-Doping Centre in Moscow.
It was intended to be the cornerstone of Russia’s bid for clean sport. The reality has proven to be starkly at odds with that claim.
In November last year, WADA announced that the facility had been responsible for a concerted and deliberate cover-up of positive tests along with the destruction of around 1400 samples.
As a result, its track and field athletes are currently under an international ban.
The WADA report recommended that five athletes be given life bans. Amongt them was the 2012 Olympic 800m champion, Mariya Savinova.
Earlier this month, whistle-blower Grigory Rodchenkov, the former head of the now unaccredited Moscow laboratory, made stunning allegations about how the lab operated during the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.
He spoke of a separate room within the drug testing facility in which tainted urine samples were exchanged with clean urine.
He alleged that steroids were dissolved in whisky for the male athletes and martinis for the females as a way of accelerating the absorption rate and thus reducing the prospects of detection through testing.
Rodchenkov asserted that at least 15 Russian medal winners at Sochi were given banned performance enhancing substances. In the end, the host nation topped the medal tally with a total of 33 medals, 13 of which were gold.
Yesterday, news emerged that 14 of the 31 positive results returned from the retested samples from the Beijing Olympics involved Russians. The IOC says the 454 retested samples were focused on athletes who were potentially in the mix for selection at this year’s Olympics.
While Russia comprised 14 of the 31 positives, the remaining 17 are spread across 11 nations.
While the Russian Olympic Committee says it will not name the 14 athletes until their B-samples have been tested, Moscow-based Match TV has revealed the names of the alleged culprits which include ten medallists.
Among them is Yulia Chermoshenskaya who won gold in the 4 x 100m relay, javelin silver medallist Maria Abakumova, and high jump bronze medallist Anna Chicherova, who went on to claim the gold medal at the 2012 London Games.
The IOC has announced that it will be retesting random samples from the London and Sochi Olympics ahead of August’s Rio Games. The IOC has also promised “swift and decisive action” into the allegations that have been raised about the possible corruption at Sochi.
If the investigation and retesting of the Sochi samples can be completed ahead of the opening ceremony at Rio, and should they indicate widespread drug use, there would be a strong case to ban the entire Russian Olympic team from the Games.
Currently there is irrefutable evidence, from November last year, of the broad use of performance-enhancing drugs in Russian athletics, hence the current ban.
As of yesterday there is a strong indication that it has spanned back as far as the Beijing Olympics eight years ago.
Aside from track and field, two other sports involving Russian athletes have been responsible for positive tests from Beijing.
Should the Sochi retests indicate widespread drug use among Russian Winter Olympians it will provide clear evidence of a systematic doping program across much of Russian sport.
There is every indication that the current practices within Russian elite level sport are on a par with the dark days of the old Eastern Bloc.
That era was a total blight on the Olympic Games and myriad other major international competitions with many worthy athletes denied their rightful place in the sun.
On June 17 when the IAAF makes its determination on the immediate future of Russia’s track and field athletes, it must uphold the current ban and refuse entry to the squad at the Rio Olympics.
Should the forthcoming follow-up testing of more recent Olympics turn up widespread doping across other sports, the entire Russian Olympic team should be removed from the Rio Games.
Such a stance by the IOC and its constituent sports federations would result in extreme bleating from Vladimir Putin down. But it is a move that would has to be taken if it can be found that sport in Russia is being systematically manipulated.
We hear ad nauseam from the world’s leading sports officials how they are vehemently opposed to drug use and cheating.
It is incumbent they act in accordance with their trumpeted beliefs and not cower to those who are laughing in their face as they stockpile their ill-gotten gains.
Professor Rosseforp
Guest
Looks like cycling is not going to be cut from Rio if we take the no-drugs approach ; I would say weight-lifting could be cut, too ; any martial arts, any gymnastics, any diving events should be culled, because of judging bias, and pre-arranged results. On the subject of walking, in over 30 years of watching, I have never seen an event where the entire field could not be eliminated for breaking the rules -- yet it's usually a token couple of people who are tossed out. Even the East African nations are coming under scrutiny for their distance running results. Each Olympics I see great improvements in our swimmers' times at the trials. I see Australian athletes with chiselled jaws and deep, husky voices. Perhaps any performance-enhancing substances are completely legal, but I think we need to be wary of pointing the finger at any other sporting nation.
Chris
Guest
Biathlon is one of those sports, like lawn bowls, that are actually bloody brilliant to spectate. At least thats how i feel. Two sports that dont seem like they should be exciting but just suck you in and watch from start to finish.
Tom
Guest
Agreed. I've always been puzzled how America can have such an abysmal doping record, and generally escape the scrutiny of China, Russia et al.
jameswm
Roar Guru
One of my favourite sportsmen in the world in any sport. Biathlon is now my favourite winter sport, even though I consider myself anti-guns. How does that work? Fourcade is so compelling and the sport in general is so good to watch. The top French woman (Dorin Habert) is in the top 2-3 in the world too - well, arguably 1 as well. Bjoendalen won 3 individual medals - how amazing is that, at age 40+?
BigAl
Guest
To me it appears that the ' high and mighty ' Aus media are treating the Russian athletes and the footy players pretty much the same - young people caught out because they lacked the power to question the processes and procedures of the powerful !
BigAl
Guest
Kenya anyone ?
Simoc
Guest
And the known Australian athlete drug cheats know exactly when they are to be tested courtesy of a phone call. It's so comfortable to be pointing a finger at someone else. Most of the top 15% of athletes in power sports will have been involved in doping at some stage and the Authorities know it. It is near impossible to police because they don't care about being caught afterwards. It's about winning. The rest is media feed.
Queries
Guest
Why aren't the Americans banned then? All their athletes get caught for cheating 3-5 years after the event.
northerner
Guest
Too true. It's interesting that, when it's the Russians, it's all about drug cheats, but at least in Aus and the UK, it's all about innocent kids/young men/30 somethings being misled into taking drugs. And plausible deniabilty takes centre stage everywhere. On the other hand, the Russian athletes have known for about 50 years that, if they get into their sports program, they're going to be cheating. It's not exactly news. So, not a lot of sympathy for them, but neither do I have a lot for the Aussie athletes pleading ignorance. Come on. Everyone wants an edge, and they all know the risks they're taking.
northerner
Guest
Why would you need a coach for running? Or swimming? You do it, or you don't. Who needs a coach to teach you to do it better. Geesh.
The Brown
Guest
Loved the comments from Sir Alfie and Torchbearer. Very true about Sharks and Essendon. I hate drugs in sport, but I also feel for the Russian athletes. Aussie journo's keep defending the Sharks and Bombers players because "they are part of a footy club and you just do as your told in a footy club. The players aren't too blame". Do you think the Russian athletes can say no to Putin and the Kremlin? They'd most probably never be seen again.......literally. For the Aus media to be so high and mighty with the Russians is hypocrisy until they start calling for the Aus sportsmen to be accountable for their own actions also!
Mattty
Guest
A walking coach? Seriously? Why would you need a coach to train you in the art of walking, let alone take performance enhancing drugs? -- Comment from The Roar's iPhone app.
Rabbitz
Roar Guru
In cross country you are correct. But in biathlon, Norway aren't as dominant. The men's competition is abosultely dominated by Frenchman - Martin Fourcade, with several nations battling it out for third place (daylight is the clear second place...). The women's events are not dominated by any one nation, however in recent years, since the retirements of Neuner (Ger) and Berger (Nor) Belarus and the Czech Republic have been closest to the top.
BrainsTrust
Guest
There is no way that Russia can compare to Norway in biathlon and cross country. Norway have 5 million and are the biggest country in both sports. They need to up their drug use or something considering per capita Noway totally dominate them,
Torchbearer
Guest
Or the Essendon defence, 'they're good young blokes, how could they know what was injected into them... we kept no records....lets pretend it never happened'.
spruce moose
Guest
That book is 20 years old. It's a good read, but it's gone past it's use by date. The IOC has reformed somewhat since then.
Rabbitz
Roar Guru
As a big fan of winter sports, especially Biathlon and Cross-Country Skiing, and as a fan of the Russian Federation athletes in these disciplines it is truly saddening to read these reports. I fear that the Sochi results will be damning. There is already much circumstantial and anecdotal evidence to suggest a high number of positives will be found. Consider that over the last two year a small number of fringe biathletes have returned positive samples - one was returning from a previous ban. There have been a number of sudden retirements of high profile biathletes from the Russian squad. These winter sports have a very small following here in Australia, however, in the Russia and the formerly Russian states the following is huge (some say biathlon is rates bigger than soccer - I don't know if that is true), so the temptation must be enormous for both athletes and staffers. It will be disappointing, personally, if this does blow up, but it is the best for the sports.
MarkR
Guest
Glenn, you might want to read The new Lords of the Rings - Andrew Jennings. He covers the way the IOC has treated steroid use in the past. Short version is - ignore, then ignore, then ignore more, then do the minimum necessary to create a perception it's not really a problem & hope you can go back to ignoring it. The cynic in me thinks this is the IOC trying to show that Rio will be a new level of drug free Olympics. They're trying to achieve this perception by throwing the Russian atheletes under a bus that's already run over them. It does make a change from the 'everyone will die from horrible diseases' stories coming out of Rio. Oh yeah, if you really enjoy the Olympics - don't read the book. The findings are very similar to his later book on FIFA corruption.
Sir Alfie
Guest
Maybe the Russian athletes could hire the Cronulla Sharks legal team and negotiate a back dated ban. Effectively serve their 3 weeks and be ready to go for Rio... ..