Tennis to step up drug fight in light of Lance Armstrong scandal

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Lance Armstrong's admission that he took drugs to help him win all seven of his Tour de France titles has put performance enhancing substances in the spotlight.
Now tennis has been brought into the debate with former world number four Guy Forget claiming he was beaten by rivals who took drugs.
Three players - Ryan Newport from the United States, Bulgarian Dimitar Kutrovsky and Italian Filippo Calorosi - are currently suspended from playing for taking drugs and Forget believes they are not the only men on the circuit guilty of doping.
BBC Sport speaks to current and ex players, coaches and officials in charge of testing to try and discover if tennis has a drug problem.

Drugs in tennis

The Men's Tennis Council began drug testing in the late 1980s with the focus mainly on recreational drugs. The testing was extended to include performance-enhancing drugs when the ATP Tour was formed in 1990.

Guy Forget claims he played against rivals who had taken drugs
But Guy Forget, who was ranked the fourth best player in the world in 1991, is convinced he played against players who were doping.
He says: "I have lost matches against guys who beat me with an unfair advantage because they were taking drugs.
"For sure, it has happened. I can look at myself in the mirror knowing I have never taken anything.
"When I played there were no controls at all so why wouldn't you cheat the system."

The situation now

The International Tennis Federation (ITF) now leads a unified Tennis Anti-Doping Programme applying across all tennis events.
The ITF carried out 131 blood tests both in and out of competition in 2011, the last year for which figures are available. That was alongside 2,019 urine tests.
Now the ITF are planning to introduce an athlete biological passport (ABP) which allows officials to collect and compare biological data and spot variances that suggest doping.
“
I feel tennis is clean, I do very much. For the amount of times that we get tested throughout the year and as random as they are, definitely
”
Maria Sharapova
It is an improvement many in the game believe is needed.
Forget added: "I don't feel our sport is clean. I am sure now as we speak there are some guys that are cheating. You cannot say tennis is not touched by this poisonous thing.
"I think it is a minority probably, but that is why Roger Federer and the other guys says we should put more money into blood test and controls because we should fight this any way we can."
Australian coach Darren Cahill, who has coached Lleyton Hewitt and Andre Agassi in the past, says on Twitter: "Our testing program is inadequate. That's why no-one can stand up and speak out. It's gone backwards in recent years."
Current world number one Novak Djokovic recently complained the number of blood tests he has undergone has dropped in the last year.
He said: "I wasn't tested with blood for last six, seven months. It was more regularly in last two, three years ago. I don't know the reason why they stopped it."

Fighting back

Dr. Stuart Miller, who oversees the ITF's anti-doping programme, claims education as much as detection is the best way to cure the problems of drugs in sport.
But he is an advocate of plans to bring in an ABP to make it easier to find the drug cheats.
Miller says: "We think we can improve by introducing what is known as the athlete biological passport, which is a blood-based testing programme which allows you to establish individual baseline parameters.
"That is not in operation at the moment. But we're looking very, very closely at it and I think that there's a reasonably good chance that that will be operational probably towards the end of 2013.
"It takes a long time to set up. There's a number of constraints and conditions that you have to satisfy, you can't just turn a switch."
What is a athlete biological passport
An ABP is an electronic document about the athlete that contains certain biomarkers from through his career.

If these markers change dramatically from the historic levels it alerts officials that the athlete might be doping.

Miller went on to answer Forget's complaints.
"I think we need to put a couple of things into context," he said. "Firstly I think Forget answered his own question when he said back at the time when he was playing, anti-doping was very different.
"There was no such thing as the World Anti-Doping Agency, there was no list of prohibited substances that all the sports signed up to and actually tennis was one of the pioneering sports in introducing anti-doping testing back in Forget's time.
"Granted, it was for a different list of prohibited substances - it was mainly recreational substances - and he's right, there wasn't as much testing, but tennis was pioneering at that particular time. And it's come a long way since that time, when he was playing."

Is tennis clean?

The leading players have thrown their support behind initiatives to weed out rivals who use drugs to enhance their performance but many are content that the sport is not on a par with the level of doping that has been uncovered in cycling.
World number three Andy Murray says: "I think all sports are trying to improve their doping controls.
"If that's more blood testing or the biological passports, that's something we need to do and improve in tennis, as well.

The three men currently banned for drug taking
Filippo Calorosi (Ita)
Dimitar Kutrovsky (Bul)
Ryan Newport (USA)

Four time grand slam winner Maria Sharapova is confident she is competing on a level playing field.
The Russian says: "I feel tennis is clean, I do very much. For the amount of times that we get tested throughout the year and as random as they are, definitely."
Tennis great Martina Navratilova, who won 18 Grand Slam titles, accepts doping has taken place in tennis but not a large degree.
She says: "There is very stringent drug testing going on and it has to be done, because there obviously has been some cheating going on as a few people have been caught.
"But overall, I think we have a pretty clean sport. You know that Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal or any of those guys wouldn't do anything like what Lance Armstrong was doing.
"I think tennis is doing a pretty good job, at least from what I see."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/tennis/21139622

not sure about this one. thoughts?

Sound's like he wants to make some money...

Do you actually know anything about this case HE?

The thing is LuvSports despite your passion for the subject I probably know as much as you

For that to happen I would have to know nothing OHHHHH NO HE DIDDDAANNNTTTTT SKADOOOSSH

I'm sorry Luvsports after your last comment I've been forced to re-calculate the sum of your knowledge about the subject of your passion. Taking that into account I have to admit I underestimated your tendency to jump to conclusions and have pre-conceived ideas's about subjects that in reality you know nothing about. I would say based on this that I probably know more about this subject than you...

Retract the claws hawkeye.

Please say why I know nothing about this subject, im intrigued

I hope it all comes out but I suspect he ill be bought off. He seems to be a purchasable commodity.

Scandals tend to go up, not down...somewhere up the chain it'll be nipped in the bud, LA is a big enough fall guy for UCI to move on seemingly unabated.

If you look at the cases of tennis players who've been "caught" by the anti-doping program, it's pretty clear that dopers are just about the only ones that aren't being caught. I don't think tennis is serious about doping, and I don't know if this biological passport is the answer. It seems to me this can easily be manipulated by giving a baseline that is full of substances at levels that wouldn't allow for enough of a delta to get a positive result on future tests...but maybe I don't understand it well enough.

MMT1... Welcome to 606v2.

ABP is a historical time line of biomarkers.

An Athlete Biological Passport is an electronic document about the athlete that contains certain biomarkers from through his career. If these markers change dramatically it alerts officials that the athlete might be doping.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/tennis/21699175

Please see these...

http://www.wada-ama.org/en/Science-Medicine/Athlete-Biological-Passport/Q--A-on-the-Athlete-Biological-Passport/

http://www.wada-ama.org/en/Science-Medicine/Science-topics/QA-on-Blood-Doping/

You're right mmt1 it is easy to skirt around, many have said so.

LuvSports! wrote:You're right mmt1 it is easy to skirt around, many have said so.

Are you sure?

From the horse's mouth...

In his recent highly anticipated interview with Oprah Winfrey, Armstrong pointed to the biological passport as one of the main factors that thwarted his ability to take performance-enhancing drugs without detection.

"It's a question of scheduling," Armstrong said. "I know that sounds weird, but two things changed this. The shift to out-of-competition testing and the biological passport. And it really worked."

http://mashable.com/2013/01/22/biological-passport-sports-doping/

yes LF as I have extensively researched the topic, I can safely say it can be easily beat and many have said so.

Ohhh yes that ever reliable source LA

LuvSports! wrote:yes LF as I have extensively researched the topic, I can safely say it can be easily beat and many have said so.

Ohhh yes that ever reliable source LA

So please provide details on how to beat an ABP. I am pretty sure WADA/ITF/UCI/ATP/WTA/FIFA would be interested.

PS: Should have mentioned this anyway... http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/cycling/news/story?id=5222488

Simple, one way is through microdosing. Ashenden has said so himself and he was one of the bio passport founders back in his UCI days.
Many know how to beat it its just a very tough task to stop them getting around it.
I think L'equipe posted last year that drug testers are 10 years behind the cheats.

LuvSports! wrote:Simple, one way is through microdosing. Ashenden has said so himself and he was one of the bio passport founders back in his UCI days.
Many know how to beat it its just a very tough task to stop them getting around it.
I think L'equipe posted last year that drug testers are 10 years behind the cheats.

So how do you like my idea of shutting down TdF for five years? No demand to win TdF == No need to dope for TdF.

A former IOC president once said "In doping, the war is never won", but that doesn't mean they will stop trying to win it.

Sorry but I don't think your idea will do anything, except bankrupt cycling and shake the foundations of the ASO, perhaps beyond repair.

What about every other race in the calendar? the Grand tours? the classics? the criteriums the time trials? By taking out the sports biggest assets do you really believe that will end doping? Honestly how realistic is that idea?

I struggle to see how your idea will achieve anything.

Is legalisation a better approach, at least for a providing a level-playing field, but then money wins because it can afford better medicine, very similar to what it is now.

If 'War' is never won, does anyone see the futility?

I had suggested getting Del Moral/Fuentes/Ferrari/Galea to partner with WADA/ITF and help stem it based on their knowledge of the 'underworld', but there may be stigma attached to such an approach (like talking peace with the Taliban, perhaps).

But as the tests get better the methods used to sidestep get tougher too...at what point does an athlete get tired of dodging hoops and just decide to not bother doping anymore?

lydian wrote:But as the tests get better the methods used to sidestep get tougher too...at what point does an athlete get tired of dodging hoops and just decide to not bother doping anymore?

When he knows he can't win without it, like now, and has a cheats mentality, and the rewards for inning make the risk / effort worthwhile. Those rewards are vast, so the effort would have to be Herculean to dissuade.

Anyway, it's an arms race and we see techniques coming in that blur the line.

MMT1 wrote: it's pretty clear that dopers are just about the only ones that aren't being caught.

Is it? That's a scandal. How did you get this clear information? Maybe you should tell someone.

Luvsports. Are you a cycling fan? That sport clearly has had a drug problem. Drugs must be a big help to anyone doing such a monotonous, repetitive, physical activity for long periods of time. I've never understood why people enjoy watching such things. I prefer tennis because it isn't just physical it involves mental skills as well.

Yes I am a cycling fan, which is why I have a strong interest for drugs in sport, but ALL sports. That comment just shows me that you are ignorant towards cycling and don't fully understand it.

Luvsports. Yes I'm ignorant about cycling as I have no interest in watching people peddle on bicycles. I have no desire to fully understand it either but it's common knowledge that the sport has had a drugs problem. But of course I do understand that others like yourself do enjoy such things.

Most sports have a drugs problem, you must understand that HE.

Does that mean long distance running, rowing, swimming, sailing, racing etc are all monotonous and repetitive physical activities?

As you don't know about the sport, maybe refrain from throw away comments like cycling is all physical and not mental, which is just utter tripe.
"Cycling is 90% mental and 10% physical."

All sports at the very highest level are mental. Athletes are all pretty similar physiologically, not much between them...but what separates the true champions is the mind being able to direct the body to do things others wont under pressure, or adopt new strategies under pressure. The mind can push people to give that 5% extra that others feel they cant give - yet could do if they had the same level of will and focus under pressure.

The problem right now isn't high tech masking of drugs...its simply not enough drugs tests being done. In tennis its laughable how many tests aren't done. I say test them every event - in (entry) and out (at loss). Compare to their baseline (passport) each time, compare to normal parameters, make it tough for anyone to cheat. Right now they're not making it tough enough, its reliant on good will too much.

FUnding is generally an issue but I agree they should do a LOT more.

If ATP were serious they would tackle this head on and cover the cost of drug testing at all events. However - it means they flag the very issue they want to avoid, i.e. they fear it paints the game as being rife in drug taking.

Its the same in every sport though lydian, it isn;t in their best interests to catch the cheats, despite what they say.

LuvSports! wrote:Its the same in every sport though lydian, it isn;t in their best interests to catch the cheats, despite what they say.

You may want to consider the possibility that Cycling and Tennis are different, or perhaps MLB and NFL are not the same as Tennis.

My only point with referring to the cases of tennis players who were "caught" doping is that there are very few cases of players who doped to get a performance enhancement who have been caught.

Wayne Odesnik didn't get caught by anti-doping controls, he was arrested by the police at the airport because he had vials of HGH on him. Now, I'm sure he had no intention of, or ever actually, ingested any of that HGH - after all, he never tested positive for it....but he was then "allowed" to take a voluntary leave from the game...but not suspended. If it hadn't have been for the police, tennis would have never known about it.

The other cases are mostly players unwittingly taking something that was prescribed or given to them by a doctor, in the case of Gullermo Canas, by a tournament doctor. Later tests revealed the banned masking agent (not a performance enhancing agent) was gone from his system in such a short period of time that it couldn't have been taken to mask a PED, but he was suspended and lost earnings anyway. And it was a tournament doctor that gave him the drug to treat a runny nose or something.

In the case of Guillermo Coria he received a multi-vitamin that even if he had reviewed and/or inquired about the ingredients wouldn't have known it had a banned substance. Coria sued the manufacturer and won an out of court settlement, but he too was still banned and lost earnings.

Mariano Hood was taking something for hair loss, that after years of being perfectly legal was put on the banned list, and then of course he failed a test. It was prescribed, but his defense (that he had been taking it for years) is hardly the defense of someone seeking performance enhancement.

Robert Kendrick took a stimulant that has been described as being no more potent than a strong cup of tea to counteract jet lag. Interestingly he took with the express purpose of getting a performance enhancement, but ITF indicated in their decision to ban him that he wouldn't have been banned had he filed for a Theraputic Use Exception - in other words, if he had come up with a sham reason to have it prescribed, despite giving a performance enhancement, they wouldn't have banned him for testing positive.

Huh?

Alex Bolgomov was banned for a steroid he ingested to treat his asthma - he too could have gotten a TUE for it, but obviously he was not taking it for a performance enhancement, but simply to be able to breathe freely. The ITF accepted his explanation and thus gave him "time served" on his ban, but why would he be banned at all? Because he wanted to breathe.

There's even a couple of cases of players who simply failed to indicated when they would be available for testing. Yannina Wickmayer and Xavier Malisse were banned for that very reason, after Belgian doping controls reported them to the ITF. They didn't fail any tests or even fail to TAKE a test, they simply failed to indicate where they would be for a test on 3 occassions, and that's it. Then they got the Belgian decision overturned and as a result the ITF lifted their ban, but there was no indication that there was enough time for them to mask or conceal any PED in their system, so wouldn't it have made more sense to simply force them to take a test immediately after the days they didn't "indicate"?

Maybe the passport it is a better way to do it, so I think it's a step in the right direction. But I just had to wondered how serious a solution this was given tennis' abysmal record with "caught" and skoflaw dopers.

laverfan wrote:

LuvSports! wrote:Its the same in every sport though lydian, it isn;t in their best interests to catch the cheats, despite what they say.

You may want to consider the possibility that Cycling and Tennis are different, or perhaps MLB and NFL are not the same as Tennis.

You really think it is in the ATP or ITF's best interests to catch a doper??? e.g. any of the big 4.
A ban would see attendances plummet along with funding, sponsors, tv coverage etc.

Tell me I am wrong.

Very astute points mmt1.

Sorry to bring up cycling again, but the biggest doping scandals have been uncovered by french police for festina 98, spanish police for puerto and usada with afld etc for Us postal team.

A lot of money is being spent on anti doping, with many saying it is wasted as it never catches anyone!

LuvSports! wrote:

Does that mean long distance running, rowing, swimming, sailing, racing etc are all monotonous and repetitive physical activities?

Well um yes... long distance running, rowing and swimming are all monotonous, repetitive activities. (I don't know about sailing or what you mean by "racing") and as such it's obvious that drugs could enhance competitiveness. As a cycling fan maybe you have felt a bit let down by all the revaluations in that sport. I'm just guessing but that could have soured your opinion about doping in sport generally?

Cycling isn't as skill based as tennis it's much more about endurance. I don't think tennis is anywhere as rife in drug taking vs cycling.

HE, sorry but I just thought you were too dismissive of those sports, that many people like.
Well my dissertation is on evaluating preventative doping measures so i started work back on it in oct and as I started digging (post LA scandal) i saw the horror of the sport but not just cycling, many other sports. I think it awoke me 2bh and I am glad it did.

When you say soured my opinion of doping, surely everyone is against it no? I'm probs barking up the wrong tree there.

Of course cycling isn't, but there is more skill required than people think.
You see that is where we don't know.
In different sports, different drugs are taken as they require different needs right?
I agree tennis should probably be less as i cannot see drugs helping much with technique and beta blockers wouldn't help I don't think.
But the way the sport is going physically, I am more and more suspicious of more and more players.

Part of me wants there to be a big scandal in sports that don't see drugs as an issue, i.e. football, rugby, and even tennis i think.

LuvSports! wrote:

laverfan wrote:

LuvSports! wrote:Its the same in every sport though lydian, it isn;t in their best interests to catch the cheats, despite what they say.

You may want to consider the possibility that Cycling and Tennis are different, or perhaps MLB and NFL are not the same as Tennis.

You really think it is in the ATP or ITF's best interests to catch a doper??? e.g. any of the big 4.
A ban would see attendances plummet along with funding, sponsors, tv coverage etc.

Tell me I am wrong.

Yes, it is in their interest. The assumption that Top 4 dope, a la Cycling and folks who wear yellow jerseys are no different from Tennis's top echelon may perhaps think such problems, pervasive in one sport, can be carried over to another.

If THASP is to be believed, there are literally hundreds at the top who are dopers. The LA case seems to have conveyed a message that anyone who reaches the top echelons of a sport, has perhaps done something illegal.

There are many who feel that such efforts are impossible. I will use an example, John McEnroe, played several 6+ hour matches, but i have yet to see him accused, as did Wilander or Skoff. The accusations seem to be targeted at 2000+ athletes. My favourite, Pancho, at 41 yo, played a two-day match with a young Pasarell when there was no TB. The rallies may be longer and physical gruelling.

When a 5'8" player could win 11 slams and many pro championships, and he is the one who says the game is much more physical than his time, I trust his observations.

I would much rather have the authorities, who have the mandate to catch players doping, do their jobs, rather than accuse a player without proof. If they need tools or financial support, it can be funded by the slams, players themselves (because it is in their interest), or the ATP/WTA.

There is no boolean right or wrong. There is also the aspect of player privacy which posters need to be cognizant of.

Luvsports. I love swimming as a participant and swim almost every day. Not so much to watch apart from the Olympics. I love it so much I sometimes feel like a missionary in my zeel to tell all and sundry that they should take it up. Ha ha!

That's interesting about your dissertation. In that light I can almost understand your "want" for there to be a "big scandal". But researchers should always be careful not to look for evidence where non exist.

How is it in their best interests though?

The vast majority of tennis fans see no failed tests = no doping. Why would they destroy this illusion by actually catching someone good?

Only when the critical mass of people who doubt the sport becomes so great that something has to give will they ever think about putting the proper resources into anti-doping.

I'm not saying the tennis authorities are corrupt and are perhaps withholding positive tests or anything, just that they make sure that their testing is lax enough that those big names who are partaking are not under much threat whilst talking a big game in terms of anti-doping initiatives.

When did Mc play 6 hour matches?

LF - If you think a sport losing its best, money making players to doping bans is in their interests, then you do that, but we shall have to agree to disagree.

HE - I do want there to be a scandal but it probably wont happen unless there is another police raid or massive investigation.
SPort is a business now (and I hate that, its not about purism anymore) and nothing can upset the apple cart as much as doping, which is why imo sport bodies just want to appear as if they are doing something, without actually doing something.
This isn't the case for everything as some are under funded massively but for the majority i think it is.

Born Slippy wrote:When did Mc play 6 hour matches?

From wiki :-
An epic performance was McEnroe's 6-hour, 22-minute victory over Mats Wilander in the deciding rubber of the 3–2 quarterfinal win over Sweden in 1982, played in St. Louis, Missouri. McEnroe won the match, at the time the longest in Davis Cup history, 9–7, 6–2, 15–17, 3–6, 8–6.

McEnroe nearly broke that record in a 6-hour, 20-minute loss to Boris Becker five years later. Becker won their match, the second rubber in a 3–2 loss to West Germany in World Group Relegation play, 4–6, 15–13, 8–10, 6–2, 6–2.

djlovesyou wrote:How is it in their best interests though?

Even if it comes out after an athlete is no longer in the limelight, of which there are many examples, the sport is tainted forever. I wanted my sons to play Baseball (closest thing to Cricket in the US), but over the years, I am disillusioned by NFL/NHL/MLB. In my own way, I have reduced the revenue.

Perhaps LS can help answer this, has LA's admissions/scandal reduced the Cycling Revenue?

We will get into subjective arguments to discuss the basis of suspicions.

LuvSports! wrote:LF - If you think a sport losing its best, money making players to doping bans is in their interests, then you do that, but we shall have to agree to disagree.

NP.

PS: What do you think of Hingis? Agassi?

Laverfan
With regard to cycling and loss of revenue, you have to remember that it is a very different sport, both organisationally and historically from tennis.

The Armstrong scandal has probably not done much to damage the sport commercially because:
1 - It is perceived that cycle racing now is cleaner than it was a few years ago (when Armstrong was winning). The bio passport has played a part, in reducing the advantage that can be gained by blood doping and/or EPO use (while not exceeding the passport limits).
2 - Many of the anti-doping sponsors were already leaving the sport after the repeated scandals (OP, Festina and several smaller scale ones).
3 - Few people closely associated with the sport were hugely surprised by Armstrong's doping, as it was clear he was comprehensively beating riders who were known to be doped.

The biggest impact on the sport has been the withdrawl of Rabobank from sponsorship - the biggest team in Holland and a sponsor that has been in the sport for nearly 20 years (actually, this year Rabo are still picking up the bill for their team, but the team kit is blank). However, this was largely peripheral to Armstrong, and came about because of repeated doping infractions within the team - the only clear connection to the Armstrong case was that former Rabo rider Levi Leipheimer was one of those who gave testimony to USADA regarding his own and Armstrong's doping practices.

As far as tennis is concerned, I find myself in a position somewhere between you and LS (and dj) - I'd be unsurprised if some of the players were doping, and don't think the ATP / ITF / WTA have a lot of incentive to catch them (and are definitely not testing anything like enough), but I don't think it's as widespread a problem as in some other sports*

*Note - this is not just a reference to the likes of cycling or track and field where the benefits of doping are clear. I'd be amazed if there is not significant doping goes on at the highest levels of professional football - we can all see that players cheat persistently on the pitch, and the financial benefits of success are so great that I'm sure many teams have looked at the potential benefits of operating a systematic doping programme (and the nature of the game means that both endurance-based doping and steroid use could be beneficial). Oh, and if you think testing in tennis is lacking in rigour, the testing in football takes it to a whole new stage of farce.

Good posts from MMT1 and others.

My biggest dilemma - If we dont want to believe caught dopers like LA on what they believe is the best way forward ( i.e their biggest hinderances). And we dont want to trust guys we suspicious of, who havent tested positive (Lord knows, I dont trust Djokovic, but in the absence of evidence, I trust his word).
Now, my question then becomes, Who on Earth do y'all think is good enough to save us?

sorry KR (can i call ya KR?) its late, im very tired from uni work, but i dont quite understand what ya getting at.

LA said they needed to up out-of-competition testing.
I think lots are on the "hot sauce" as crazy aussie youtuber durianrider says (give him a look if you get the chance).

On your last point i can only assume you are talking about ...................................jesus.
The drug battle will never be won, but atm we are not going about it the right way.

Yeah, its alright, LS (sorry, I have calling you this for a while, without asking. Can I call you LS?). I think my main point is that we really pessimistic about dope in sports. I think imo, Its not as bad as they say, but not as good as we think.

I would prefer you called me by my true name "Iki iki iki patang zoopoing em phoow". LS is fine bud.

I think its much worse than it is made out to be 2bh, but each to their own.

My reasoning has always been that athletes, are normally reasonable people, never gotten a parking ticket. So to do something like doping, in the absence of a culture being present in the sport is a jump.

I remember that when Agassi came out with his book, some former pros stated they always thought AA wasnt clean, but they thought it was a PED, so unless there is an accepted doping culture in the sport, I think the average athlete knows as much about the next guy as we do.

.That is the story I always look at when I hear people say player X said doping is rife. A case of "You think you know, but you really have no idea"

But how do you know that though? The testing in tennis is so abysmal, doping is so easy to do.
I agree that we the spectators are kept in the dark but I think we are the only ones, I think everyone else knows what is going on.

As I am a big fan of cycling my outlook is bleaker than most but I still think it applies to most sports.

Tennis is different obvs but now the game is so physical and their powers of recovery are so immense, it causes me to be very suspicious.
I am very suspicious of athletes but i will never go as far and say player x is doping.