A-Rod hit with 211-game ban, Germany orders probe into ‘culture of doping’ in 70s
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A DOPING scandal involving one of baseball’s biggest stars is the latest in a series of cases in sport this year that have led to repeated calls for a tougher line on drug cheats.
New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez was banned for 211 matches on Monday after Major League Baseball named him as one of 13 players to have used banned substances, including testosterone and human growth hormone.
He received a hostile reception from Chicago fans in Monday’s game against the White Sox, being relentlessly booed and jeered, while being subject to chants of “Steroids! Steroids!”
He had one hit in four at-bats as the struggling Yankees lost 1-8.
“The last seven months has been a nightmare. It has been probably the worst time of my life for sure,” Rodriguez said.
“A-Rod” is still eligible to play as he is appealing the sanction but his alleged use of proscribed drugs comes after a succession of high-profile scandals Ñ and a steady drip of others that have made fewer headlines.
Politicians in Germany are looking into a report about the extent of a government-backed doping program in West Germany from the 1950s in a number of sports, including football.
The German Olympic Committee has asked an independent body to analyze an academic report on organized doping in the former West Germany, its president Thomas Bach said.
The report said doping became systemic after the establishment in October 1970 of the Institute for Sport Science, which fell under the interior ministry.
The institute gathered the elite from sports science and sporting federations and for decades coordinated tests with performance-enhancing substances, according to the report. The report also touches on suspicions relating to football before the 1970s. According to a letter from a FIFA official, traces of ephedrine were found in three unnamed West German members of the 1966 World Cup final squad against England.
That doping exists in sport is nothing new. The use of amphetamines dates back almost a century, while the Soviet Union began using male hormones and the United States anabolic steroids in the 1950s. What has changed is the ability of anti-doping agencies to detect banned substances, through retrospective testing and the introduction of biological passports to detect anomalies.
That in part accounts for the apparent spate of cases, as does the rise in the use of supplements by athletes.
A number of countries are also seeking to criminalise doping, given increasing evidence that the provision of banned substances is linked to organized crime. Nevertheless, with sanctions varying from sport to sport, there are mounting calls for a more standardised anti-doping code across all sports, plus greater financing for in- and out-of-competition testing and scientific development to stay one step ahead of cheats.
World Anti-Doping Agency director-general David Howman warned in May that the fight against doping could reach breaking point if more money was not found to finance testing.
“It really worries me because I think nobody knows how much we have to do now,” Howman said. “It seems that each year we get asked more and each year we do not get any more money.
“At some stage, things will break and I do not want to be there when it happens because it would be very embarrassing for everyone.”
Toughening rules and sanctions against dopers and even their entourage are likely to dominate the WADA conference in South Africa in November.
Candidates to replace Jacques Rogge as president of the International Olympic Committee have also made anti-doping a priority. But as one candidate, Germany’s Thomas Bach, said last week: “The fight against doping will never end. We will never reach the stage where there are no doping cases. There will always be people who try to give themselves an advantage in sporting competition.”
Since January, cyclists Lance Armstrong, Erik Zabel, Jan Ullrich have been nailed for doping. Leading sprinters Tyson Gay and Asafa Powell tested positive in July. On Monday, 31 Turkish athletes were banned for two years while Russia has suspended 40 athletes.
In tennis, Serbia’s Viktor Troicki, a former world No. 12 and Davis Cup winner in 2010, was banned for 18 months.
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