Reviews

Ben Johnson

The Drug Cheats

7th November 2008

With the recent 10 year sentencing of Tim Montgomery the drugs in sport situation seems to be improving. However, why has it got to this stage? Why are new athletes suffering for the crimes of the drug cheats?

The first case of a well known athlete being caught is that of Ben Johnson. On the second Saturday of the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games Johnson was the 100m Olympic champion, the world record holder, the greatest athlete to ever grace the 100m track. He was, as the Toronto Star put it, “Benfastic”. However, by the Monday he was a fraud and a liar. Johnson's urine samples were found to contain Stanozolol and he was disqualified. Johnson still pleads his innocence but will always have the title of the greatest drug cheat of all time.

Johnson’s positive drug test result did not deter other sprinters from cheating but seems to have spurred them on. Tim Montgomery, a relay runner, broke the 100m world record in 2002 and was found to have taken steroids. He is currently serving a ten year sentence in prison for a number of charges including fraud.

The greatest female athlete of the last ten years, Marion Jones, also tested positive for dugs. The treble Olympic Champion was stripped of all her medals after pleading guilty to taking Tetrahydrogestrinone. 

It is not the drugs cheats that are the main sufferers of their crimes. They know they may get caught and so when they do they have had their time in the spotlight. It is the current athletes who pay the price because nobody knows whether they are genuine. Usain Bolt’s incredible performances at the Olympics have been called into question by Carl Lewis, the man who finished behind Johnson in 1988. “When people ask me about Bolt, I say he could be the greatest athlete of all-time. But for someone to run 10.03 one year and 9.69 the next, if you don't question it, in a sport that has the reputation it has right now, you're a fool.” This scrutiny and suspicion has risen from the early drug cheats and now any athlete who performs superbly is questioned.

The attitude of Carl Lewis, a nine time Olympic champion, is not wrong in the current environment, but the saying ‘innocent before proven guilty’ comes to mind. There is no evidence to suggest that the top athletes of today are taking drugs, but when watching an incredible performance there is always a question in the back of our heads asking whether that performance was down to talent and hard work or a concoction of chemicals.  

Overall, the outlook for athletics is grim. The sport will never lose the selfish, dishonest, disgraceful people who call themselves athletes – the drug cheats. Therefore, any talented youngster looking to go into athletics will always know that along the way to greatness they will face skepticism and doubters.

The Review Online