Русская версияThe doping record of Beijing 2008 would appear to suggest so.
Only
six athletes have tested positive, with samples from four days of
competitions pending examination.
And no athletes from Olympic giants China, the United States,
Russia, Britain, Germany or Australia -- who topped the medals
table -- are among the offenders.
However, the truth is we will need to wait till 2016 to know
whether the Beijing Games were as clean as the figures suggest.
IOC president Jacques Rogge said Sunday that samples will be kept
frozen for eight years. Whatever illegal substances were not
detected during the Games can yet be discovered.
The world has already had a similar experience. Until two years ago
few would have doubted to say "Marion Jones" when asked about "the"
star of Sydney 2000. She is now in jail, her image destroyed.
More positive tests likely from Beijing
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Spanish cyclist Maria Isabel Moreno was the first caught
Brazilian Eduardo de Rose, an expert with the World Anti-Doping
Agency (WADA), told the DPA news agency that there will be other
cases of doping at the Beijing Olympics.
"There will without a doubt be more cases after the closing of the
Olympic Games," he said. But he denied that there are doping
methods that officials do not know about.
"I do not think there is a system that we do not know," he said.
"Nowadays when there is something like this we always hear about
it. I do not believe in anything magical. In any case, if there
were anything that has not been detected, we will look for it and
we will end up detecting it."
That is an optimistic approach in line with Rogge's. The president
of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had predicted 30-40
cases of doping in Beijing.
"We believe that we have had fewer cases because the deterrent
effect has been augmented," Rogge said on the last day of the
Games.
He explained his earlier estimate as an "extrapolation" following
the 12 positive cases in Sydney 2000 and the 26 in Athens 2004, but
stressed that extrapolations are only mathematics.
"It has become more difficult to cheat because - a) - we have
augmented the number of tests from 3,500 in Athens to 4,500 now.
Secondly, we have also increased the penalties," he said.
Rogge stressed the deterrent effect of the decision to ban from the
next Games any athlete given a suspension of six months or more.
The IOC president recalled that there were 39 positive cases in the
month before the Games, which he thinks should be included in the
Games' final tally on doping.
More advanced nations not among those caught
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North Korea's Jong Su Kim was stripped of his two medals and
expelled
However, there is one important point: the positive tests that have
been known so far involve almost exclusively countries with lax
testing or with a tradition of endemic doping.
And in many cases the substances found are "prehistoric," things
that no star would dare use in central countries because they would
easily be caught.
Doping offenders were weightlifter Igor Razoronov of the Ukraine,
his compatriot heptathlon specialist Lyudmilla Blonska, Greek
hurdler Fani Halkia, North Korean shooter Kim Jong Su, Vietnamese
gymnast Thi Ngan Thuong Do and Spanish cyclist Maria Isabel Moreno.
Before the Games, 22 weightlifters from Greece and Bulgaria
received sanctions.
(Deutsche Welle)
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