Johan Blake!

[Alverton]

Can we not just admire the performance, instead of an immediate conclusion that they must be jacked up?  I hate to say it but when Bolt crushed Beijing my first thought was 'I wonder when he'll get found out' and I hated being that cynical.  

Also wasnt there a strong wind behind them in the str?  Had to have knocked off a few 10ths.  I thought Oscar Pistorius mentioned something after the 400, that he couldnt believe they were going so hard into the wind @ the start?  Wasnt the times for all the events fast, near sb's, pb's?

[ACE2M]

from nowhere a load of sprinters from a small country suddenly become the best the world has ever seen. you got to be high not to jump to some conclusion.

[redarmi]

from nowhere a load of sprinters from a small country suddenly become the best the world has ever seen. you got to be high not to jump to some conclusion.

I have no idea whether the current crop of athletes from Jamaica are jacked up or not but the comment above is largely incorrect.  Jamaicans, and, small Caribbean nations in general have a long histopry of doing well at sprint events (400m and below) and long jump too.  Furthermore a great deal of very good athletes from other countries have Jamaican parentage yet have had very little or nothing to do with their athletics federation so I think it is a bit more complicated than them simply using drugs.

[ACE2M]

from nowhere a load of sprinters from a small country suddenly become the best the world has ever seen. you got to be high not to jump to some conclusion.

I have no idea whether the current crop of athletes from Jamaica are jacked up or not but the comment above is largely incorrect.  Jamaicans, and, small Caribbean nations in general have a long histopry of doing well at sprint events (400m and below) and long jump too.  Furthermore a great deal of very good athletes from other countries have Jamaican parentage yet have had very little or nothing to do with their athletics federation so I think it is a bit more complicated than them simply using drugs.

Name 4 - off the top of my head i can name 3 of real notable quality. Current athletes from jamaica alone - i can name 6 or 7 world beaters.

[redarmi]

I can name three gold medalists since i have followed athletics - Merlene Ottey, Deon Hemmings and Veronica campbell.  In the same period Linford Christie, Kelly Holmes won with two Jamaican parents and Ato Boldon and Kim Collins both won titles from the Caribbean.  Since 1984 Jamaica has won 11 medals in relays alone in the Olympics and that is depite only winning two medals in last two games when they have been clearly the best in the world.  Like I said I don't have a view on whether they are taking drugs or not.  They may well be but I think physicality has a lot to do with it and possibly diet.  Carribean nations and those with parentage from the Caribbean have long overperformed in sport and not just athletics.  They are massively overrepresented in football, basketball, cricket....pretty much every sport that is widely played in the region.

[redarmi]

Just done a bit more research into this.  The following athletes from recent years were all born in Jamaica but didn't represent Jamaica: Linford Christie,  Tessa Sanderson, Donovan Bailey, Sanya Richards, Ben Johnson (heehee), Germain Mason and Angella Taylor.  All won gold medals at worlds except Mason who won a silver and Taylor who won a couple of commonwealth golds.

[BrumBilly]

Linford was done for cheating as was Ottey...sometimes the doped athletes get out before they're caught (Flo-Jo), sometimes their federations cover up their positive tests (Carl lewis) and sometimes they're so stupid they believe they'll never get caught and can just carry on selling people the bs line about 'better training' and 'natural talent' till they get caught (Marion Jones, Ben Johnson, Butch Reynolds...this list is endless!).

That's not to say that Jamaica have suddenly produced a whole crop of men AND women (rather than a spattering of talented individuals like Ray Stewart) who are clean in a very 'dirty era'. Anyone who believes the sport is clean at the top level is living in a dreamworld.

Given the fact so many athletes worldwide have been proven cheats it's difficult not to be sceptical about these miracle performances. I hope Bolt gets out before he gets caught if he is cheating (which I don't think is that big an 'if'...).

We should be setting an example on this front. The likes of Chambers and Ohurugu who both cheated (one messed up his screening agent so failed a test, the other dodged the testers) should be barred from competing for Britain at every champs (Olympic and Worlds) instead of taking the limelight and robbing clean athletes....Chambers robbed many a title from Jason Gardner and god knows how much in sponsorship deals and Ohurugu denied Nicola Sanders a gold medal at the World Champs.

[Micko]

BrumBilly what about Michael Johnson, would you include him in drug cheating when he competed? It's just when i watch coverage he sounds so against drug cheats and has't much time for them.

He was an amazing athlete so he prob was cheating.

[Nico29]

Linford was done for cheating as was Ottey...sometimes the doped athletes get out before they're caught (Flo-Jo), sometimes their federations cover up their positive tests (Carl lewis) and sometimes they're so stupid they believe they'll never get caught and can just carry on selling people the bs line about 'better training' and 'natural talent' till they get caught (Marion Jones, Ben Johnson, Butch Reynolds...this list is endless!).

That's not to say that Jamaica have suddenly produced a whole crop of men AND women (rather than a spattering of talented individuals like Ray Stewart) who are clean in a very 'dirty era'. Anyone who believes the sport is clean at the top level is living in a dreamworld.

Given the fact so many athletes worldwide have been proven cheats it's difficult not to be sceptical about these miracle performances. I hope Bolt gets out before he gets caught if he is cheating (which I don't think is that big an 'if'...).

We should be setting an example on this front. The likes of Chambers and Ohurugu who both cheated (one messed up his screening agent so failed a test, the other dodged the testers) should be barred from competing for Britain at every champs (Olympic and Worlds) instead of taking the limelight and robbing clean athletes....Chambers robbed many a title from Jason Gardner and god knows how much in sponsorship deals and Ohurugu denied Nicola Sanders a gold medal at the World Champs.

While you write well and make some half decent points, i feel your statements are largely entirely conjecture and libellous at that. I gen don't believe bolt is on drugs and wish ppl wldnt sling prev examples and wishy washy stats at the guy. If you think everyone is on drugs in the sport i really don't understand why you still proclaim it to be your favourite sport. I've 100m final tickets for the olympics-sick brag-and cannot wait to see what i consider to be the greatest event in sport.

[BrumBilly]

I do think we've seen some exceptional athletes down the years who were/are clean but some athletes/performances just stink to high heaven. Michael Johnson is one of the greatest athletes of all time and he was very vocal during his career about drug abuse in the sport and distanced himself from cheats like Butch Reynolds (didn't want to run on same relay team...if memory serves...unlike athletes who protest against 'foreign' cheats like the Brit athletes who made a show of themselves while Yegerova ran...yet are quiet of a mouse when the dirty athlete is wearing the same club/country vest).

I hope Bolt is clean...if he's one of the cheats (of which there are many...Ben Johnson was right when he said he wasn't alone in 'that race') then I hope he retires soon and doesn't get caught. I just wouldn't bet on it.

That said, I still LOVE watching the sport (grew up watching Coe and Ovette so spoiled as a kid re British success) Footballers 'cheat' in every match but we still watch.

Re your tickets, I'm VERY jealous. Hope you witness one of the great 100m finals including a head to head between a fit Bolt v Gay.

Enjoy!

[redarmi]

To be fair there have been more than a handful of drugs cheats who have proclaimed a hatred for cheats before they got caught.  Linford Christie being a good example.