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Testing Sport?s Limits : Cheating, Doping, and Technology

By Kim Krawiec

Last week, in Vive Le Tour! Vive Le Dope!, I discussed the issue of doping in professional cycling, contrasting the views on sports doping of Harvard Political Philosopher Michael Sandel and Judge Richard Posner, and suggesting that both missed an important function of ?cosmetic? doping restrictions designed to provide spectacle that looks like sport.  This week, news of cheating issues in sport continues to abound.

In cycling, from The New York Times:

The Tour de France stage winner Mikel Astarloza was suspended Friday by the International Cycling Union for doping before this year?s Tour. . . .

Astarloza had a positive test for the endurance-booster EPO in an out-of-competition control on June 26, eight days before the Tour de France began. He won the 16th stage of the Tour on July 21.

The union said it has provisionally barred Astarloza from racing until the Spanish cycling federation can hold a disciplinary hearing. He rides for the Euskaltel-Euskadi team.

So much for the ?clean Tour.?

In baseball, from the New York Times, If Every Team Was Doping, Why Use Asterisks?

Click here for video of the story, Foul Play.

And for those who missed Zev Chafets, author of Cooperstown Confidential: Heroes, Rogues, and the Inside Story of the Baseball Hall of Fame (pictured right) on the Colbert Report last week, it?s here:

(HT: David Keeney) 

In swimming, via the New York Times:

FINA, the international governing body of swimming, announced that the ban on polyurethane suits would take effect Jan. 1. Suits will be restricted to textiles or woven materials. The coverage of men?s suits will be limited to between the waist and the kneecap and women?s suits to between the shoulder and kneecap.

. . .

Thirty-five world records have fallen in the first six days of the world meet, seemingly cheapening the value of what used to be the gold standard in the sport.

There?s sure to be more drama to follow ? not everyone believes that this Genie of technology can be put back in the bottle.

And my favorite sports cheating story of the week (via Freakonomics) relates to British rugby player Tom Williams:

Apparently there is a rule in rugby, as in soccer, that once a substitution is made to take a player out of the match, that player can?t return to the game. The exception to this rule is ?blood injuries,? in which case a player can come off until the bleeding is stopped and then return to play.

 

Tom Williams suffered just such a blood injury at a very critical moment of a recent match. . .

 

Eventually, television footage revealed that Williams had pulled a capsule of theatrical blood out of his sock and bitten into it in order to produce the faked injury. . . . not only did Williams get suspended from the league for a year, his substitute also missed the kick and the Harlequins lost the game by a single point.

 Related Post: Vive Le Tour! Vive Le Dope!

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on August 02, 2009 (boomark / email).