FOC Secretary-General in favour of long-term doping clauses

Italy will charge any found guilty in Vancouver with a fine of EUR 100,000

Jouko Purontakanen

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The Italian Olympic Committee has thrown down the gauntlet against doping in the week leading up to the Vancouver Winter Olympics.
      It announced that any member of the Italian team who gives a positive doping test in Vancouver should expect to receive a bill for EUR 100,000 in the form of a fine.
      "The Italians are on the right lines here. It's a big country, and one where sportsmen and sportswomen get a good deal of financial support. Our way of working is rather different", commented Jouko Purontakanen, the Secretary General of the Finnish Olympic Committee on hearing the news.
     
Those athletes receiving support from the FOC have signed precise and detailed agreements, which also include doping clauses.
      "If a test comes back positive, the athlete loses the support he or she has received in the current competition-year. We are not talking about hundreds of thousands of euros, but sizeable sums nevertheless. Long agreements, in which the athlete is considered from all aspects, are best in our experience", says Purontakanen.
     
In his view the doping clauses should cover the entire season - not just the big top that is the Olympics, but also the everyday round of smaller competitions.
      "If we were to make deals like this [Italian] one just for the majors and Worlds and Olympics, somebody might charge that it is a populistic gesture."
      Individual sports associations representing specific disciplines have made agreements with their athletes on occasion that contain a "doping fine" clause.
      For instance when shot-putter Ville Tiisanoja got caught in 2006, he was slapped with a EUR 50,000 fine for his troubles.
     
Jouko Purontakanen will be travelling to Vancouver today.
      He promises that the FOC will adhere rigidly to the rules of the International Olympic Committee.
      National committes are obliged to ensure that their athletes are available for testing at all times.
      Purontakanen notes that in Beijing in 2008 there were a good many countries who did not follow the regulations to the letter and still got away with it.
     
He knows very well what the subject of conversation with foreign colleagues is likely to be in his first few days in British Columbia.
      The admission by former Olympic gold medallist Mika Myllylä of the use of EPO in his cross-country skiing career is going to be a major talking-point.
      "It is good that the truth has come out. I just find the timing rather strange. If his confession had been made last April [in conversations with the National Bureau of Investigation], why was it made public at this particular juncture?" wonders Purontakanen.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Ex-Olympic skier Mika Myllylä admits to having used EPO hormone (3.2.2010)

Links:
  Finnish Olympic Committee

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