Gay ban
Tyson Gay, the fastest man in the world this year and the 2007 World 100m champion (beating Asafa Powell), tested positive in May for an unidentified banned substance, and he has more-or-less admitted he is guilty, and today was dropped by his sponsor Adidas. He'll probably get the same four-year ban as Justin Gatlin did. A fair punishment?
In Kenya, the IAAF and the Kenyan Athletics Federation set up an inquiry into claims that there was widespread drug use in the country's distance running training camps. In Russia, there are 42 athletes currently suspended for doping. With the World Championships in Moscow just a month away, this is a huge embarrassment. In Turkey, eight athletes are under investigation but reports suggest the number under suspicion could be much higher than that. And, perhaps most damaging of all, Jamaica are now facing difficult questions about doping after three of their biggest names tested positive for banned substances. Veronica Campbell Brown, the two time Olympic 200m champion, has already been suspended for using a diuretic well known as a masking agent while Asafa Powell and Sherone Simpson have both produced an adverse finding.
What upsets me more about these people, and the Lance Armstrong's of the world, is that the people they unfairly beat never got the credit they deserved, the riches, the sponsorship, the TV appearances and fame that goes with being a winner.
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