Inside Dope: The Dope Inside

Over the weekend I read a couple of books to pass the time while traveling to and from Washington, DC. While I was walking to the gate to make my connection in Memphis, two men walked by. One was a short, skinny, weasely-looking guy with his black hair “styled” in a mullet, and the other guy was pretty big. A wedge, as we used to call highly muscular athletes when I was a swimmer in high school back in the mid-70s.

The little guy keeps saying to the big guy, “I can take that bag for you.” And the big guy responds, “Nah. I wouldn’t want you straining yourself.” The little guy keeps looking at me like I’m some kind of threat, so I slow down and let the two men pass. And then I notice that everyone is staring at the big guy, who’s wearing a bandana and has a big, almost white fu-manchu type mustache. It dawns on me about the moment I see the “WWE” logo on the little guy’s pseudo-letter jacket: That’s Hulk Hogan and his assistant. They’re motoring down the hallway pretty quickly, with heads craning to see Hogan as he passes by.

Shoulda introduced myself and seen if he’d answer some questions about doping in the pro wrestling ranks. Then again, I might’ve gotten stomped right there. Anyway, about those books I was reading, one of them was Inside Dope.

If you knew nothing about the doping in sports and read this book, you would think that Dick Pound is the Messiah sent by the Big Guy to save sports from the cluctches of evil.

As regular readers of this blog will know, I have very little positive to say about Dick Pound. But one thing I will say is this: The man can spin an engaging tale.

While he asks some big questions in his book, and even provides a few interesting tidbits from the front lines of the anti-doping wars, Pound often goes off into flights of fancy, where the facts are dubious and his storyline ventures into the world of opinion. And Pound apparently has never met a topic that he didn’t have a strong opinion about. That’s not a problem, as far as I’m concerned. We all have opinions. But when Pound stakes out an opinion, he sticks to it, never wavering and never changing his tune.

In his book, he makes a comment about having the same attitude as people from Missouri, my home state. But Pound shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the “Show Me” state’s motto. Not only does it mean prove to me what you say, but it implies that if you show me I’m wrong, I’ll be flexible enough to change my mind. Pound never gives any indication that he would be willing to change his mind about the people and events he discusses.

Pound starts off well, asking questions like:

Do you want your children to be forced to become chemical stockpiles in order to be successful in sport, simply because of the cheaters who are using drugs and who could not care less that they are compromising their whole sport?

Do you have any idea whether your child’s coach is someone who, as part of coaching, would be encouraging or condoning the use of drugs?

Are parents part of the problem?

Of course, the answers to these questions are fairly predictable. But they serve to draw the reader in to Pound’s point of view on whatever he happens to be pontificating about. There is no shortage of loaded questions with obvious answers throughout the book.

And Pound is in fine form when it comes to his opinion of those athletes who don’t rollover and “admit” their sin, as well as those who would defend an accused athlete:

By far the greatest misdirection comes from those who have been caught and those paid to defend such improper conduct.

This last quote comes from the ironically named first chapter, Rules Are Not Made to Be Ignored. Except, perhaps, if you’re an anti-doping laboratory leaking information to the press. Or when one needs to offer up a sacrificial Landis to the anti-doping gods in the hopes of curing cycling of its rampant doping problem, of course.

Pound offers up numerous examples of doping incidents from the last three decades to illustrate his main point: Doping is an epidemic running through all sports that is more deadly than the bird flu or ebola. He even does something I never expected — offer up examples of doping from his own sport, swimming.

Many of the big scandals get mentioned. The East German doping program gets a prominent discussion, and Pound claims that in other countries (like China, where their swimmers’ performance dramatically improved) the coaches, trainers and doctors from the fabled East German program are still plying their old trade.

Pound talks about Balco, and how Tim Montgomery came to be banned from competition (without a positive drugs test, but instead based on the testimony of Kelli White, among others) along with a number of other athletes. He talks about EPO and how it affected athletic performances. And he never wavers from his main point, which is: Doping is the biggest threat to organized sport that has ever come along.

And he defends the strict liability rule, justifies it, and then goes even further:

Even possession of a prohibited substance by an athlete can be a doping violation, unless the athlete has a properly granted TUE (therapeutic use exemption) or other acceptable justification. It is not necessary that there be a positive test result before a doping offence can be said to have occurred.

So, if you’re competing and subject to the random tests, be very careful about what you have in your house or in your travel bag. Sudafed — pseudoephedrine — is a banned substance, after all. Even if you have a cold.

In between all of his bombastisity he even scores a few points on which most of us can agree. Doping in sports is wrong. Doping and other forms of cheating are huge threats to competitive sports. And the people who cheat should be punished. But where I part company with Pound is in the way the anti-doping process should work. Pound is a staunch defender of the system as it is currently formulated.

Pound’s point of view is that if everybody just bought into WADA’s World Anti-Doping Code, and if everybody let WADA do their thing, and if everbody just cooperated with WADA, then WADA could solve the doping problem. He even offers up a 10-step program modeled on Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12-step program.

To give him credit, if the system were really designed so that accused athletes could get a fair hearing, Pound’s 10-step program might help. But as things are currently formulated, the system seems more bent on convicting all who fall into the Anti-Doping Wonderland. For a good article in the mainstream media on this subject, check out the LA Times story, Athletes’ unbeatable foe. The writer presents a very thorough discussion of how the anti-doping system is stacked against accused athletes, and though it is a quasi-judicial system he talks about how the anti-doping process differs from our system of justice.

As you can expect, Dick Pound doesn’t shy away from controversial stories in his book. Even though it has already come back to haunt him, Pound devotes 6 pages to discussing the doping allegations against the Austrian cross-country ski team in a section he calls Repeat Offenders: Austrian High Jinks At Turin. And he doesn’t spare Lance Armstrong or Floyd Landis from his skewer, either.

All in all, Inside Dope does a good job of giving the Gospel of WADA according to Dick. It is a decidedly one-sided effort aimed at making the case for the World Anti-Doping Agency and why it should lead the anti-doping efforts in the wide world of sport.

If you must read Inside Dope, do what I did: Buy the book used. It’s not worth purchasing new.