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Anyone for Tennis?

by kwi
Tue, Mar 08, 2016 07:43
8

Now the doping scandals are hitting tennis, after the recent match fixing scandal as well.

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/sport/tennis/maria-sharapova-ban-tennis-star-facing-one-year-suspension-after-accepting-positive-test-for-meldonium/ar-AAgvl2D?ocid=spartandhp

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Carton | 8 years ago
1 like

It never ceases to amaze me how protective people are towards those they find relatable and how easy they find it to deflect any and all blame towards those they don't. It's the fault of some mediocre collector and old men conspiring to tarnish our yom-kippur-respecting golden child (Ryan Braun); or some fame-hungry masseuse and journalist abetted by an equally fame-hungry cowboy FDA agent, neglecting his real responsibility to catch mass murderers or something, in order to tarnish our cycling messiah. Or the one that gets me the most, why punish the poor driver who barely ran a red light and hit a cyclist, "cyclists" do it all the time, if he cared for his safety he would have worn a helmet. We are wired to empathize with those we "know" and discredit those we don't.

I thought this should be obvious by now to cycling fans: catching dopers is hard. An analytical positive is absurdly hard to get. Particularly on the handful of tests a year that pro tennis associations allow. Their testing impetus makes 00's era cycling testing seem inquisitorial.

I liked Sharapova. I think she's a fighter, a great story coming out from Siberia to international success and a rare occasionally insightful interview. But this is did not happen because someone missed an e-mail, or forgot to put a drug name in bold and all-caps. This happened was taking a exquisitely rare performance enhancing drug. 

Is it possible that what she's saying is true: sure. Anything is possible. But if we insist that it is better that one thousand guilty people walk free that one innocent person suffers then clean sport will remain galaxies away from a moonshot. And many more people, hapless kids nearly the lot of them, will suffer. I'd rather risk subjecting their heroes to undue scrutiny than subjecting them to faustian bargains. YMMV.

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davel | 8 years ago
0 likes

I agree with Willo.

Sharapova has a particular reputation for attention to detail and maximising her brand in a field where those attributes are a given, and the meds are usually used by old ladies with heart defects.

1 she didn't need to be taking it for medical purposes
2 bollocks did she or her team not read an update from Wada.

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Stumps | 8 years ago
1 like

L.Willo  -  A quick question - did she take it every day for 10 years or just as and when she needed to ????

She started taking it 10 years ago it doesnt mean she was taking it every day for 10 years.

 

Your hypothesis about being some biochemist is hardly relevant when this was a freely available medication to all and sundry, over the counter in some cases and not a knocked up concoction.

As i said though everyone is entitled to their opinion.

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themartincox replied to Stumps | 8 years ago
0 likes

stumps wrote:

 

Your hypothesis about being some biochemist is hardly relevant when this was a freely available medication to all and sundry, over the counter in some cases and not a knocked up concoction.

As i said though everyone is entitled to their opinion.

 

except it wasn't available in the country she lived in for any part of those 10 years.

 

But, hats off to her, an elite level athlete who is able to perform with a heart defect chap-ruddy-eau I say to her!

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L.Willo replied to Stumps | 8 years ago
0 likes

stumps wrote:

L.Willo  -  A quick question - did she take it every day for 10 years or just as and when she needed to ????

She started taking it 10 years ago it doesnt mean she was taking it every day for 10 years.

 

Your hypothesis about being some biochemist is hardly relevant when this was a freely available medication to all and sundry, over the counter in some cases and not a knocked up concoction.

As i said though everyone is entitled to their opinion.

From her statement yesterday:

"For the past 10 years I have been given a medicine called mildronate by my family doctor and a few days ago after I received the ITF letter I found out that it also has another name of meldonium which I did not know."

Maybe not every day but I read that as regularly.

In any case, Sharapova has lived in the USA since she was 7 years old. So when she discovered that she was suffering from angina and borderline diabetes, at the age of 16 .... presumably American doctors and medicine were not good enough. She had to track down her good old family doctor in Mother Russia and only Latvian pills ... that just happen to have a performance enhancing effect ... would do.

Smells like BS to me but we can agree to differ.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/tennis/maria-sharapova-fails-drug-tes...

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Stumps | 8 years ago
1 like

Sharapova has made a mistake and thats all, in my opinion. She had been taking the meds for 10 years and it wasn't on any banned list from WADA.

Yes she's been an idiot not opening an email from them.

I assume she will get a ban and thats just right because ultimately she has failed a drugs test but it doesn't sit with the likes of Mauro Santambrogio and Valentin Iglinsky.

There will be some who say she did open the email but continued regardless and is therefore a cheat and they are entitled to their opinion.

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L.Willo replied to Stumps | 8 years ago
5 likes

stumps wrote:

Sharapova has made a mistake and thats all, in my opinion. She had been taking the meds for 10 years and it wasn't on any banned list from WADA.

Yes she's been an idiot not opening an email from them.

I assume she will get a ban and thats just right because ultimately she has failed a drugs test but it doesn't sit with the likes of Mauro Santambrogio and Valentin Iglinsky.

There will be some who say she did open the email but continued regardless and is therefore a cheat and they are entitled to their opinion.

 

If she has been abusing drugs when she doesn't have any medical reason to do so, just to boost her performance, she is a doper and a cheat as far as I concerned. Ethically.

Let's say that I am a biochemist and knock up some secret concoction of drugs in my home lab and use it to boost performance and win 5 Tour de France before the authorities clock what I am doing and ban it. Those 5 TDFs would be tainted in my opinion, even though technically I had not broken any rules as my homebrew was not be on the banned list at the time.

Remember Marion Jones et al were banned for using substances not on the banned list but purely designed to give an unfair advantage.

The questions for me are:

- did Sharapova (aged 18) have a genuine medical condition to justify use of this drug?

- is this a chronic condition that required the use of this drug for 10 years when the manufacturers state that it should be used for 4 - 6 weeks?

- what dosage was she taking? The recommended therapeutic dose or the 1 - 2 grams per day typically used by dopers?

If she cannot give satisfactory answers to those questions then her whole career is tainted and she deserves the book thrown at her.

 

PS Someone who claims that she also took this drug because she was worried about diabetes in her family .... and then peddles sweets under her Sugapova brand telling everyone just what a sweet tooth she has ......I think we can add unscrupulous hypocrite into the mix.

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Welsh boy | 8 years ago
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No sport at the top level is clean, there is a limited window of opportunity for very motivated people to make as much money as possible, some will be tempted to cheat either to maximise their earnings or to satisfy their ego.  I seem to remember when operation Peurto broke that tennis and football were implicated but their controlling bodies hid it better than the cycling bods did.  I await the day that football is exposed, how will all those fan boys who idolise overplayed men who are tired after running around for 90 minutes cope?

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