Marion Jones Seeks Sympathy on Oparah

Marion Jones recently made an appearance on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" seeking sympathy and admitting that she made a mistake when she did not tell the truth. She probably still is not telling the truth when she claimed she could have won the medals even without using PED's.

If you really believe that, why would you cheat? So you could beat the competition by an additional one-one hundredth of a second? Fans of track and field are not that neurotic: either you win the gold or you don't. They don't care or remember what your margin of victory was. Quick: anyone know Usain Bolt's margin of victory in either the 100 or 200? I thought so.

The reason she gave for not telling the truth in a tearful letter written to her children while in prison was "because I didn’t love myself enough to tell the truth". Great statement and better yet, excellent audience and the tears definitely helped sell the whole story. However, at the end of the day, you cheated. You lied about it and denied it for years, going so far to write a book and claim that you were clean.

What would have worked better for a comeback, would have been to take full responsibility and say you were a misguided person attracted to the fame and fortune of athletic greatness and would do anything necessary to achieve your goal. Now, older and wiser, you see the error of your ways and seek the public's forgiveness. That would have went over huge with the Oprah crowd. Once again Marion, you blew it.

Conveniently, there was no mention of the check writing fraud that led to her incarceration.

Carl Lewis Doubts Usain Bolt

In a revealing interview with SI.com, American Olympic icon Carl Lewis isn't buying what Usain Bolt's selling when he said, "for someone to run 10.03 one year and 9.69 the next, if you don't question that in a sport that has the reputation it has right now, you're a fool. Period. "

Lewis then went on to praise the best random and most comprehensive drug testing program (the U.S.) and contrast that with Jamaica. "Countries like Jamaica do not have a random program, so they can go months without being tested. I'm not saying anyone is on anything, but everyone needs to be on a level playing field."

Lewis goes on to say, "No one is accusing anyone. But don't live by a different rule and expect the same kind of respect. They say, "Oh, we've (the Jamaicans) been great for the sport." No, you have not. No country has had that kind of dominance. I'm not saying they've done anything for certain. I don't know. But how dare anybody feel that there shouldn't be scrutiny, especially in our sport?"

Reflecting on the 9.8 threshold that Bolt surpassed this year. "Let's be real. Let me go through the list: Ben Johnson, Justin Gatlin, Tim Montgomery, Tyson Gay and the two Jamaicans. Six people have run under 9.80 legally, three have tested positive, and one had a year out. Not to say [Bolt] is doing anything, but he's not going to have me saying he's great and then two years later he gets popped. If I don't trust it, what does the public think?"

Lewis addressed one issue I raised in an earlier post questioning when Jamaica became the sprint capitol of the world when he questioned how the women's world 100 champion cannot make the Olympic team. "I look at someone like [Jamaican track star] Veronica Campbell-Brown, who lives in the United States, and has been transparent and consistent. She won the worlds last year in the 100 meters and this year she can't even make the team? And you're going to tell me that shouldn't be questioned?"

Lewis is also not a fan of how admitted cheaters are still able to influence young athletes. "Here's what angers me: Antonio Pettigrew [a North Carolina assistant track coach who testified in federal court that he took human growth hormone and EPO between 1997-2001 while winning the 4x400 relay gold in the 2000 Olympics, a medal he returned in June] kept his job and he's coaching young athletes. This is wrong. There have to be consequences for your actions."

I agree with Lewis that Pettigrew should not be coaching young athletes, especially at a public university. He is an admitted doper and the line of athletes "learning from his mistakes" doesn't fly. Carl Lewis in this interview has done the impossible: by invoking five variations of "not saying anyone is on anything", Lewis essentially said Usain Bolt cheated without saying he cheated! If you're not saying anyone is anything, doubting Bolt's accomplishments and advocating a level playing field, then what the hell are you saying Carl?

You were on the forefront with Ben Johnson, be out on front again...but you have to say it.

When Did Jamaica Become the Sprint Capital of the World?

After having time to digest the Beijing Olympics, I'm left wondering the same thing: when did Jamaica, a nation of 2.8 million people, dominate both men and women sprinting?

When Jamaica swept the women's 100 meters the night after Jamaica's Usain Bolt become the World's Fastest Man (WFM), something didn't feel right. It didn't help that the Shelly-Ann Fraser, the winner of the 100m with a time of 10.78, didn't have a time under 11 seconds until this year. Another flag that came up: Fraser was sporting braces. High levels of HGH use include teeth gapping. Fraser is 21, comes from the inner city in Kingston and it's clear that she's going through braces later on in life. She is also a member of the Stephen Francis coached MVP Track Club based at the University of Technology.

The defending world champion in the 100m, Jamaica's Veronica Campbell-Brown, did not even qualify for the Olympics, yet ran the fastest 4th place qualifying time in the 100m. Campbell-Brown is not coached by Francis nor is part of the MVP Track Club. Another development that makes Fraser's performance in Beijing so unbelievable, is that per The Jamaica Observer in August 2007, she was "really looking ahead to the 2012 games in London, England, where she is picturing herself winning the 100m gold medal." The '08 games were not even a possibility less than a year ago. What changed so quickly in that time period for Fraser?

Looking at the world champion Veronica Campbell-Brown's yearly progression in the 100m, the biggest yearly decline was .37 of a second when she was 17 going on to 18. Since achieving a yearly personal best under 11 seconds in 2004, it has wavered .14 a second between 10.99 and 10.85 seconds. Her progression appears normal while Fraser came out of nowhere and was targeting the Olympics four years from now.

Jamaican women's sprinting history begins and ends with Merlene Ottey, the "Queen of Track." She has won medals at the Olympics for Jamaica in the 100m starting in 1984 through 2000. How is that longevity possible? No male had such a streak. During that period, there was some controversy involving PED's. In 1999 at an international meet in Switzerland, both "A" and "B" urine samples were positive for the steroid nandrolone. She claimed she was innocent of knowingly taking steroids. Eventually, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) cleared Ottey of all charges in the summer of 2000. In 1998, she already had moved to Slovenia and began training with Slovene coach Srdjan Djordjevic while still representing Jamaica, but started representing her new country in 2002.

As for the men and Usain Bolt, everything has been said that needs to be said: unbelievable. When comparisons are being made to Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton, we're getting way ahead of ourselves...easy Stephen Francis, coach of MVP Track Club. Everyone wants to believe they saw history on the track, much like in the summer of '98 when McGwire and Sosa were chasing "history." We're a society of suckers. The X-Files was right: We want to believe.

The problem occurs when Ben Johnson, Justin Gatlin and Marion Jones amazed us with their superhuman accomplishments, vowed that they were clean and then ended up serving doping suspensions. A reporter from the New York Times reported that the way to beat the urine test is to drop a grain of powdered laundry detergent since it will destroy EPO and HGH in the sample. With the positives not nearly matching the expectations, it looks like the cheaters are once again ahead of the testers.

Will the Jamaicans continue to dominate sprinting on the world stage or is this a temporary blip? When the women's world champion doesn't even qualify for the Olympics and then the country sweeps the 100m, I'd say they have the women's side locked up for the near future. With Bolt, everyone else is racing for second. Will other sprinters be tempted to dope to bridge the gap to catch up to Bolt? Wait and see.

Michael Johnson to Return Gold Medal

Michael Johnson has decided to return the gold medal that he won along with his teammates in the 1,600 meter relay from the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. In a column he wrote for the Daily Telegraph, Johnson was "shocked" to learn Antonio Pettigrew, someone he considered a friend, used PED's from 1997 to 2001.

When Jerome Young tested positive for PED's in 1999, Pettigrew and Johnson discussed whether to give back the medals. Since Young was exonerated, Pettigrew convinced Johnson that they were in the right to keep their medals, even though Pettigrew "was guilty and the medal was tainted anyway."

Johnson has "been naive," but does not buy the excuses everyone needs to use PED's in order to compete because everyone else is using and that coaches are pressuring athletes to use PED's.

Johnson supports the crop of new stars: Jeremy Wariner, Allyson Felix, Tyson Gay, Christine Ohuruogu, Usain Bolt (current WFM) and Asafa Powell, but can understand how the public can be skeptical of their performance. Many of the athletes who admitted to using PED's never tested positive.

As I speculated in a previous post, when three of the four runners in the finals have admitted to using PED's, there are only three possibilities regarding the fourth: he was using, he didn't know or he knew, but took the high road and raced clean.

As for Pettigrew, is he out of the hospital yet? Johnson threw him under the bus! By taking the high road, Johnson forced Pettigrew to give up his medal. If Johnson didn't do the right thing now and return the medal, when would he?

New World's Fastest Man; Let the Speculation Begin

Usain Bolt of Jamaica set the world record in the 100 meters on Saturday and became the World's Fastest Man. As mentioned in an earlier post, WFM is code for roid head. Knowing now what we know about former WFM's, speculation is already swirling around Bolt.

Bolt, like many WFM before him, has denied taking PED's and has not failed a drug test. Skeptics are out on front on this one because Bolt has only run the 100 five times professionally, yet in that span recorded two of the three fastest times ever. Either he truly is the fastest man and will continue to get better, or he is working with new undetectable PED's.

Even with his lack of experience in the 100, Bolt is an accomplished sprinter. He has focused in the past in the 200 meters and was the first junior sprinter to break 20 seconds. At the 2007 world championships, Bolt finished second to Tyson Gay. Ironically enough, Gay, the 2007 world champion in the 100, finished second to Bolt on Saturday with a time of 9.85.

Mary Wittenberg, chief executive of NY Road Runners and race director for the NYC Marathon said, "I think we can believe these performances more than ever before. I think there's a higher level of fear among agents, coaches and athletes than ever before, and I think that is serving us well."

I disagree with Mrs. Wittenberg. Why do athletes use PED's? Because they work. The amount of money involved in becoming the WFM, endorsement deals, gold medals has become so big that the temptation to dope is overwhelming. Does Marion Jones regret cheating? No, she and Tim Montgomery regret getting caught lying to the feds.

When an athlete sees their former heroes shamed and admit to doping, it will only lead them to choose to dope. This naivete to think the controls and fear we have in place are sufficient has led track and field to become a fringe sport where the majority of people who follow it, assume some, if not most, athletes are doping of some kind.

Bolt's coach, Glen Mills, cited Bolt's conscience and the fact that Bolt does not even take vitamin C as reasons why his client is clean. Gay has voluntarily entered into a program where he is being tested regularly to diffuse some of the skepticism of his performance. Gay admited the sport has a credibility issue when he said, "People will have suspicions probably as long as track and field is going on."

Not taking vitamin C does not preclude you from taking an undetectable steroid and being tested regularly could be seen as a pr stunt if Gay is on an undetectable steroid. The cheaters are usually always ahead of the enforcers, but hopefully there are a few clean athletes who mean what they say and years from now don't have the mea culpa in front of the courthouse, but don't hold your breath.