Olympics boss Juan Antonio Samaranch provokes rage by seeming to endorse drug taking in sport

By TIM BLAIR

n Olympic competition, timing is everything. Gold medals are won or lost on split-second decisions to release the javelin, surge to the front of the marathon field, or dismount from the parallel bars. Last week, Juan Antonio Samaranch showed how timing could grab worldwide headlines: amid a series of drug scandals which enveloped the Tour de France bicycle race and inflamed demands for more rigorous testing for illicit substances, the International Olympic Committee president made comments which many saw as a backdown in the fight against drugs in sport.

Speaking from the Lausanne, Switzerland, headquarters of the I.O.C. to the Madrid-based newspaper El Mundo, Samaranch said: "Doping is any product which, first, damages the health of the sportsman and, second, artificially increases his performance. If it produces only this second condition, for me that's not doping. If it produces the first, it is." Samaranch argued that international sport needed an exact definition of doping, to go beyond the list of prohibited substances drawn up by the I.O.C.'s medical commission, and added: "The current list of [banned] products must be drastically reduced. Anything that doesn't act against the athlete's health, for me that's not doping."

The most furious responses came from Australia, which will host the next Olympics in 2000. Federal Sports Minister Andrew Thomson said he was "gobsmacked" at Samaranch's comments. Former world champion marathon runner Robert De Castella said: "It scares me to think that Samaranch might just be throwing up his hands and saying, It's all getting too hard." Lee Naylor, the athletes' representative to Athletics Australia, was one of many to raise opposition to Samaranch's continued role as I.O.C. president: "If that's the attitude of the leading Olympic official in the world, then you have to question whether he's suitable for the job." Some drew wider conclusions; Labor Party sports spokesman Stephen Martin said: "Mr. Samaranch's call for the relaxation of banned drugs goes against the spirit of sport in Australian life." As the controversy grew, results of drug tests on more than 500 of the nation's elite rugby league players--conducted after a rash of suspensions for steroid use--were being compiled.

In Europe, as the prestige of the Tour de France was punctured by the Festina team's expulsion for drug use and police raids on several teams' hotels, English former Olympic 800-m champion Steve Ovett accused Samaranch of "throwing in the towel" on drugs. British Amateur Athletics Association head Sir Arthur Gold said: "These are very unwise remarks by the I.O.C. president. No one knows for certain which drugs are dangerous to the health, but if they enhance a person's performance, it is blatant cheating."

The outrage forced the I.O.C. and Australian Olympics chiefs into a spin campaign worthy of the most supple gymnast. "I think there is a lot of misunderstanding about what he said," I.O.C. medical commission vice chairman Jacques Rogge told Sydney radio station 2UE. "The way it was printed was a little bit inaccurate." New South Wales Olympics Minister Michael Knight, who spoke to Samaranch the day after his comments were reported, offered this clarification: "He made it clear he believed there were no performance enhancing drugs that did not cause harm to the health of athletes. No such drugs existed is the way the president explained it to me."

Making it difficult to explain away the remarks was that the newspaper interview was conducted in Samaranch's native Spanish, that it was presented in a question-and-answer format, and that Samaranch has not directly refuted comments attributed to him. "He gave the interview and he hasn't made any comment at all since then," I.O.C. spokeswoman Michelle Vernier said. "We're not going to clarify it." A clearly vexed Kevan Gosper, I.O.C. executive board member and vice president of the Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games, told television reporters in Lausanne: "He's usually so careful in what he says."

And Samaranch's words have generally been against drugs, even those that may hinder athletic performance. After Canadian snowboarder Ross Rebagliati tested positive to marijuana during this year's Winter Games, Samaranch announced he would seek a ban on soft drugs in Olympic competition and established a working group within the I.O.C. to formulate a policy on marijuana. Three years ago Samaranch and S.O.C.O.G. representatives signed a deal "to pursue to their utmost ability a drug-free Sydney Olympiad."

The next step to achieving that will come in January, when the I.O.C. will hold a conference to seek a tighter definition of doping. It may lead to a revised list of banned substances; many in the I.O.C. and throughout the sports world want such substances as headache tablets and cold medicines purged from the list. As for a drug-free Sydney Olympics, Australian I.O.C. member Phil Coles said: "Anyone who thinks that is possible is living in Disneyland." Most in world sport seem to accept the impossibility of eradicating drugs; few tolerate any wavering in the fight against them.