Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) Pubdate: Wed 29 July, 1998 Contact: http://www.smh.com.au/ Author: MATTHEW MOORE DRUGS IN SPORT : WHY THE IOC BOSS IS NOT PLAYING GAMES Australians may be incredulous, but the big man of the Olympics appears to have decided that if you can't beat drugs in sport, it's time for some lateral thinking, writes MATTHEW MOORE. WHEN the sprint champion Ben Johnson tested positive a decade ago now, the world was stunned. Olympic officials reacted immediately, vowing to step up their war on athlete doping as the only way to preserve the ideal of Olympic competition. This week the president of the International Olympic Committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch, conceded the war can't be won. Despite all the noise and all the money and all the dope-testing, more athletes are using more drugs more often than ever before. Like the US forces in Vietnam, Samaranch has realised he's fighting an unwinnable war. This is the only conclusion that can be drawn from the remarkable interview with the Olympic movement's most influential person. Two full days after the Samaranch interview was published in the Madrid paper El Mundo, Olympic organisers in Sydney are struggling to understand how it could be that the Olympic chief has changed his mind so dramatically on how international sport should deal with drugs. Samaranch wants two changes. The first is to "drastically" cut the number of banned drugs and the second is to only ban drugs which damage the health of an athlete. He specifically said drugs which only improve performance should not be banned. This was no accidental slip of the tongue, despite the hopes of senior sports officials around the world, especially in Sydney. Samaranch gave his interview at a time of overwhelming evidence of widespread drug use among elite sportsmen and women. To ensure he would be accurately reported, he elected to be interviewed in Spanish, his mother tongue. With the Tour de France crippled by daily drug revelations, Samaranch knew questions would focus on doping. Given his international network, he was certain to be aware two American athletes - both medal winners - - were about to be suspended for doping offences. He gave the interview just as four Chinese swimmers were suspended for two years for testing positive in Perth this year. Samaranch is still waiting for the Irish gold medal-winning champion Michelle De Bruin to have her case heard. He may know of a host more positives in the pipeline. No matter who tests positive now, though, they will never shake the world as Ben Johnson did. Drug use in sport has simply become too widespread, too commonplace, for the world to be surprised any more. That seems to be the conclusion Samaranch has come to in recent weeks. What he is advocating is a tactical retreat to a position that can be more readily, and credibly, defended. Finding this place is the problem. He will find plenty of support among drug-testing agencies for a much simpler list of prohibited drugs. Why have hundreds and hundreds of banned substances, including widely available pain-killers and cold remedies, when many of them can't even be detected in testing? That's fine in theory, but reality is more complex. A boxer can take pain-killers so he won't hurt when he's hit, but surely this makes him a more dangerous opponent. In the expected outcry following his interview, Samaranch called a summit at the IOC headquarters in Lausanne in January where he would like "a clear definition of doping" to emerge. He is right to identify this need, but he knows how difficult it will be to achieve. The whole world of doping is full of inconsistencies and a summit is hardly going to resolve them all. Ask why doping is banned and you get three common reasons: it gives athletes an unfair advantage, it is bad for their health and it is a bad example for the young. That's fine, until you argue these points to their logical conclusion. Sure, doping gives you an advantage, but so does high altitude training, government funding, space-age equipment and sports psychologists. Why not smooth out some of these bumps as well? Australia's response to Samaranch has been largely one of incredulity and anger. He's been condemned for chucking in the towel. But the evidence is he is responding to a more pragmatic view of drug use that appears to exist in Europe. For days after the Festina team were booted out of the Tour de France, spectators called for their return. Cyclists in the race staged a two-hour strike in support of them. Perhaps Samaranch has decided drugs are the one issue that can kill the Games if a workable solution is not found. And he's decided to have a go at finding it, no matter whom he upsets. - --- Checked-by: "Rich O'Grady"