Doping and Indian Sports

Having just spent a glorious People's Sunday at Wimbledon watching Roger Federer play some sublime tennis (and Tim Henman some pretty sub standard stuff), I felt the need to blog this:

There's this article in the Telegraph today that has been making less waves than it has. But I was looking up some old articles about doping in Indian sports, particularly following the Sunita Rani controversy and came up with this astonishing article. If this stuff is true, then our entire sports structure is not that different from the erstwhile East Germany. It would also explain really poor performances at the Olympics and so on. All this is very mystifying for another reason as well. If you do take banned stimulants, and this is an 'official programme' then the least one ought to aim for is international glory. But assuming that this true, this systematic doping doesn't seem to have improved our performances at the international level at all.

Weightlifting, of course has been in the spotlight before. Further, India is hardly alone in this whole doping controversy thing. With the noose tightening around Marion Jones and Tim Montgomery, clearly there's a lot we ordinary sports fan don't know about.

(On a personal note, I must say all this is hugely disappointing. Growing up, I've always hugely admired those with sporting talent, and I'm sure many of us revere those with extraordinary sporting abilities. The truth is that most of these athletes- dope tainted or not, would be pretty special anyway- I don't think only steroids could have made Marion Jones who she is- she's clearly hugely talented anyway. But it means that come August, when I switch on the TV to follow the Olympics, the niggling doubt that pretty much every single athlete or maybe even swimmer, was possibly on performace enhancing steroids will seriously rob me of the joy of watching them perform).