One sportsperson breaks his own world record. We applaud him. However, one more tests positive for drug after the recent positive tests of Gatlin and Landis.

The common excuse for taking drugs usually are - the competition is too tough, others might be taking it and I thus have no choice.. Well, you cheated and betrayed the trust of your fans. There is no justification. Sport is harmed in the process though and that is some thing which angers me more than any thing when any sports person is found out to have taken drugs.

A sports person might see that he isn’t that good and find himself in a position to not lose much. He might also suck into the pressure of maintaining past levels of performance or improve and might be willing to risk credibility in the pursuit as well. So he might take drugs. Sport suffers. For, the heroes do not remain heroes any more. Doubts may be cast over genuine heroes who do not take drugs as well. The worst effect is a portion of people not following a specific sport or sports in general as a direct impact of sports persons being found out.

A sad reality.

After the doping finds at the beginning of the tour, what cycling needed was a heroic performance to bring authenticity to the sport. We seemed to have that with the efforts of Landis. Now, Landis is under a cloud. He denies it and his mom denies it as well. When Shane Warne was caught with drugs, he said that his mom gave it to him. Landis or his mom can’t expect to beat the audacity of Warne’s statements though of course.

BBC’s Matt Slater sums up the situation well:

To say the discovery that the winner of the Tour de France may have been cheating is bad news is perhaps the biggest understatement since James Lovell told Mission Control, “Houston, we’ve had a problem.”

Of course, Floyd Landis may be cleared, but with its credibility already hanging by a thread, the Tour needed this like a stick in the spokes.

Whatever happens and was the truth regarding Floyd Landis, the reputation of cycling, already weak, has been shaken and if new fans do not get attracted to the sport in the future, you can’t really blame them.

Half the contingent of Sierra Leone has disappeared (ran away) from the Commonwealth Athletes Village in Melbourne. Reports Reuters:

Police and Australian immigration officials have been searching for 11 athletes from the war-ravaged African country who have gone missing from the village.

This is not a new phenomena as 20 athletes went missing after the Manchester Commonwealth games in 2002. Of course the war plagued athletes will find this as a window for better life. A risk much less compared to living in the war ravaged country. Sport isn’t as important when the problems are much larger. The Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) isn’t going to rule out Sierra Leone for future games. Political dimplomacy evident in sport and sport again proving that it is life magnified.

India is proving difficult to handle with the doping scandal. The answer CGF President Mike Fennell gave explaining the doping occurences is amusing though:

It’s a very large country, over a billion people, and perhaps there will be people who are perhaps not as knowledgeable about the drug situation and the doping situation, and there will be instances.

The closing ceremony of the games is to be held today with bollywood stars staging a performance. Also, Javed Akhtar will present a song for the Delhi Games. I haven’t witnessed an international sporting event in India bar the Cricket World Cup in 1996. So come Delhi 2010, it will be nice.

Update: A few of the athletes have spoken out. They say that they fear genital mutation and death if they go back.