Dear Mr. Pineau,
Dear Mr. Pineau,
I am writing to help in the effort to convince the Denver Federal Court to allow the release of the database of USOC doping records from 1984-2000. I believe the release is vitally important to the integrity and survival of the sport of Track and Field in this country.
I could speak at length on the personal ramifications of this near-criminal drug cover-up. I tried out for 4 Olympic teams over 16 years and finally managed to achieve my dream with a 3rd place finish in the 1996 10,000m Olympic trials, thus making my first and only Olympic team. Since that time, I have learned that two of my competitors (in other distance events) tested positive for drugs and that for all of those 16 years they STOLE world and Olympic team spots away from deserving, clean athletes. Regina Jacobs and Mary Slaney reaped every possible benefit from our sport - and raped the rest of us in the process. Now, I come to realize there may have been even more cheaters ahead of me. More rapists. Why should they be allowed to bask in the glory - false though it is - of being Olympians when who knows how many young men and women … ALL those 4th place finishers (like I was in 1992) … were never able to realize their dream. It is beyond shameful.
Track and field, all sports for that matter, is about dreaming. You dream about running faster, and jumping higher, and throwing farther. You dream about making an Olympic team on every single run. If you take away that dream (and give it to dirty cheaters) then you are left with a bunch of business-men and women who are in the sport ONLY for the money. Not for the dream. How are these crooks any different from the bums at Enron?
I now coach a youth running club in Chapel Hill, NC and I want to be able to encourage each boy and girl that running is a pure sport - the Olympics, a noble pursuit - worth their time and dream energy. But if this drug MESS doesn’t get cleaned up once and for all, if the USOC doesn’t do the right thing and release the truth … the truth, dammit … then a whole generation of track and field athletes will be lost. They will quit, in disgust, after college.
I am not bitter. This is not a personal plea. This is about the sport I love, have loved my entire life. I want to see its rightful heirs - clean and true - take their crowns. If I could, I would throw syringes at every one of the drug-using, money-grubbing, glory-raping bums whose positive drug tests were covered up from 1984 to 2000.
It’s time to do the right thing and set the record straight.
-joan nesbit mabe
us olympian 1996
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It is a good letter (and I agree with it), but I really wonder if it is directed to the wrong person, because I fear that it is largely irrelevant to Exum’s employment claims. And Pineau is simply representing Exum in an employment matter. The case has nothing to do with what the USOC should or should not do. The public, however, has an interest in what the USOC has been doing — a public interest that exists no matter what the USOC’s basis was for terminating Exum’s employment in Colorado Springs. So why does Exum want the database information? Is it to blackmail the USOC into a favorable financial settlement? Is it to embarass the USOC and the athletes who tested positive for something like pseudophedrine? Is it to glorify himself? And will Pineau use this issue to promote himself? I have too many questions about the vehicle that is being used to seek the information. So, how about a grass roots campaign to lobby the USOC? Or Congress, which could subpoena the information and then make it public? Given the Congressional interest in performance enhancing drugs (particularly steroids in baseball so far) and Congress’s unwillingness to address issues like health care, the environment, poverty, etc., I’m sure that someone would be happy to take up the cause. In all seriousness, if the Democrats take back the House in the fall election, I bet that Henry Waxman could be convinced to subpoena the information and hold hearings that would hold the USOC’s actions up to public scrutiny.
Comment by Steve — 4/19/2006 @ 4:30 pm
I just did a quick search on letsrun.com for “drugs” and there were thousands of posts about the corruption of our sport (at the elite level). I think, as a nation, we choose to stay naive [la la la! I can't hear you! my hands are over my ears. LA! LA! LA!] about the reality of drugs b/c we so desperately need to believe in the sappy “up close and personal” wide world of sports stories we all watched on TV as kids. If you lived in abject poverty in a 3rd world country and some track coach explained to you that a scientifically proven protocol of drugs along with hard training would bring you and your entire family out of poverty - for life - wouldn’t you sign up? Its a no brainer. Here’s one (among 1,000’s) post I read:
Comment by Joan — 4/20/2006 @ 11:11 am
Hi Joan,
Thanks for taking the step to write that letter. I know that can’t be an easy decision. Directed at the correct person/agency or not, it is something that needs to be said and I feel is something that most Americans would be surprised to learn. Not being an avid T&F follower for the first 36 years of my life, I had no idea that testing results would have been hidden or ignored. I think that most in the halls of congress would be surprised to learn this as well. Maybe I’m naive. Governing body looking the other way for a quick buck (like baseball) I can understand. But having a testing policy and then ignoring the results is different. Having been an avid T&F follower for a couple years now, during Victor Conte and BALCO influence, I often feel a sense of doubt when I see an amazing accomplishment on the track or field. I don’t want to always follow up, “Wow, that was incredible” with “Wonder if they were using?” I’m sure it’s the same feeling as swimmers got in the 70s and 80s when watching East German women gliding through the water. And you know, why can’t the Ethiopian track coach just say to his student, “forget the syringe, if you work hard, you can be the best runner in the world.” Was Abebe Bikila juiced up in 1960? Barefoot, setting a world record, first African to medal in any games. I doubt it. Why would you need a syringe when you had a hero like that to look up to. Shame on any coach that would taint that dream. My son and daughter get to see Barry Bonds and the like shatter records every few days. Doesn’t mean anything more to them than watching some stranger win a prize at the state fair. Interesting for a moment and then forgotten two minutes later. They know he’s a cheater (because we talk about that stuff). I want them to see Alan Webb come back and set a new record or Shalane Flanagan from our home track win a gold medal. Maybe they’re cheaters too, staying one step ahead of their competition and the last best drug test. I don’t want to believe that and I would definitely appreciate a system that lets me know for sure so I don’t have to say, “Was she using?”
Comment by Jimmy B. — 4/20/2006 @ 1:45 pm
Your letter (and other posts on this topic) seem to imply that you believe that one (or more) of the three people who placed in front of you at the 1992 10K Trials was dirty. Is this your belief? If so, those three athletes were: Lynn Jennings, Judy St. Hillare and Gwyn Coogan. Which of these three do you believe to have been dirty?
Comment by Point Blank — 4/21/2006 @ 8:50 am
Actually, I was 4th at the Olympic Trials in the 3,000m in 1992 (not the 10,000 with Jennings & co.) and I don’t have any “belief” that any of my competitors were dirty. My letter was more of a what if, you know? If there were, indeed, over 100 positive drug tests that were covered up between 1984 to 2000, the chances are that more than a few were in distance events … and even if I wasn’t DIRECTLY affected in the 3k, it doesn’t matter; other men and women who finished fourth - in the sprints and hurdles and jumps and throws, JUST LIKE ME, were robbed. Any one of the 100+ positive test results from a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place finishers kept #4 off the team. I was speaking for every 4th place finisher who might (or might not) have been cheated. Please don’t try to get me to point a finger. Until those positive drug tests are released, I can only point at the ones who have been busted: Mary Slaney and Regina Jacobs. I can only hope all the other names will be released to join them on the DISHONOR roll.
Do you, Point Blank, by any chance have a personal interest? What do you know about drugs?
Comment by Joan — 4/21/2006 @ 2:45 pm
Good on you Joan. Pressure does get results sometimes. Witness Becky Scott of Canada in XC skiing, she won the bronze and then eventually moved up to Gold when Gold and Silver tested positive. I think that “athletes” who cheat should be CRIMINALLY charged, they are in effect stealing from the other athletes. We all know that Regina Jacobs won all kinds of money that as far as I see it she STOLE from those behind her. Same for Ben Johnson, the sums he STOLE run into the hundreds of thousands. At least, here in Canada, something was done.
Comment by George Muenz — 4/24/2006 @ 11:19 am
Joan, I bet some flunky from the IOC or USOC will give you grief for posting the Olympic rings on your blog. I think you should re-post that graphic with one ring missing to show that it is not complete as a result of the drug use that is covered up;
Comment by George Muenz — 4/24/2006 @ 11:32 am
George,
Your comment is wothy of a post.
thanks
Comment by Joan — 4/24/2006 @ 12:46 pm
Comment by Mr. Pineau's reply — 4/25/2006 @ 3:45 pm
This topic is really drawing a lot of attention from the news media. I recently watched a news broadcast siting the prolification of performance enhancing drug use.
Comment by Sarah Summer — 2/4/2008 @ 8:10 pm
I applaud your effort here. And it confirms my suspicion that probably 90-100% of professional athletes are taking some form of illegal performance enhancement drugs.
I am actually starting to wrestle with the notion that, as new forms of drugs are developed and new methods of enhancement are invented, such as gene doping — some of which will be extremely safe (especially when compared to anabolic steroids) — that it might be time to finally just lift the ban on everything, because it will not only be pretty untraceable, but the people that do manage to use them will be so far ahead of everyone else that it will just make a mockery of whatever sport.
The next 10-20 years will be very interesting.
Comment by Sarah Summer — 11/7/2008 @ 10:37 am