Beijing Olympic Games

Chambers fails in bid to overturn Olympic ban

By Martyn Herman

LONDON (Reuters) - Sprinter Dwain Chambers cannot take part in the Beijing Olympics next month after failing to gain an injunction against a British Olympic Association (BOA) ban in the High Court on Friday.

The 30-year-old was challenging a BOA by-law which states that any athlete found guilty of using drugs is barred from competing for Britain in any sport at the Olympics.

Chambers, who won the 100 meters at the British Olympic trials last weekend in 10.0 seconds, completed a two-year doping ban in 2006 after he had tested positive for the designer steroid THG in 2003.

The London-based sprinter’s legal team had argued that the BOA ban represented a restraint of trade.

However, judge Colin MacKay said if the case had gone to a fully-contested hearing he was not satisfied that Chambers had a reasonable prospect of proving his case.

He said to have allowed the challenge meant “the harmony and management of the British team would have been upset.”

BOA chairman Colin Moynihan said the verdict sent a strong message to other athletes.

“It’s a matter of regret that Dwain Chambers, an athlete of such undoubted talent, should by his own actions have put himself out of the running to shine on the Olympic stage in Beijing,” Moynihan told reporters outside court.

“The BOA will continue to send a powerful message that nobody found guilty of serious drug-cheating offences should have the honor of wearing GB vests at the Olympic Games.”

Chambers made no comment after the hearing despite being surrounded by a throng of reporters and cameramen outside the court before escaping down a narrow side street.

APPEAL UNLIKELY

With the International Olympic Committee (IOC) deadline for naming team members coming up this weekend, Chambers is highly unlikely to launch an appeal against the decision.

UK Athletics had named only Simeon Williamson, beaten by Chambers at the trials, for the 100 meters in Beijing. Sprinter Craig Pickering is now expected to be added to the team.

“We now consider the issue closed and look forward to Beijing and must all turn our focus to our final preparations with the athletes who will represent Great Britain,” UK Athletics said in a statement.

The Chambers case has dominated British athletics this year and split opinions throughout the sport.

He was controversially selected for the world indoor championships in Spain, against the wishes of UK Athletics, and won a silver medal.

The BOA’s stance has gained support from many leading names in the sport including former British gold medalist Sebastian Coe, now vice-president of the governing IAAF and chairman of the London 2012 Games, and rowing great Steve Redgrave.

After serving his ban Chambers briefly returned to athletics in 2006 and was a member of Britain’s gold medal-winning 4×100 meters relay team at the European championships that year.

Chambers was stripped of the gold he won at the European championships in 2002 and was asked to return a substantial amount of prize money he had earned while taking drugs.

He made an unsuccessful attempt to forge a career in American football and earlier this year had a trial with rugby league team Castleford.

(Editing by Ken Ferris)

Chambers ban stands and BOA defends bylaw

LONDON (TICKER) —British Olympic chiefs will review their lifetime ban on drugs cheats after the Beijing Games, it was revealed.

The British Olympic Association will order a survey of all Olympic athletes for their views on the bylaw after the Games, but the organization’s chairman Lord Moynihan insisted Friday’s court victory over Dwain Chambers would strengthen its resolve to keep the rule.

The sprinter lost his bid to run in Beijing after the High Court refused to grant an injunction temporarily suspending a lifetime Olympic ban.

Despite the ruling, judge Mr. Justice Mackay gave a warning to the BOA.

“Many people both inside and outside sport would see this bylaw as unlawful,” Mackay said. “In my judgment, it would take a much better case than the claimant has presented to persuade me to overturn the status quo at this stage and compel his selection for the Games.”

Afterwards, Moynihan insisted the ruling had strengthened the BOA’s position but revealed it would commission a survey to ensure the athletes were also behind the bylaw.

“We will ask the British Athletes Commission, which is independent of us, to undertake a survey on the bylaw after Beijing,” he told PA SportsTicker.

“Today has strengthened our resolve that it’s the right approach but we also want to make sure we are reflecting the athletes’ wishes. I don’t believe today will change that bylaw but we need to keep it under review.”

Moynihan said that a previous survey had shown 90 percent of the athletes were in favor of the BOA’s lifetime Olympic ban for serious drugs cheats.

The International Olympic Committee last month toughened its rules so that any athlete being banned for six months or more for a doping offense would miss the next Games after their ban has ended.

Moynihan said the judge had recognized that under the new IOC rules Chambers, who was given a two-year ban in 2003 after testing positive for the designer steroid THG, would have been ineligible for Beijing.

The judge also made the point that the BOA has a tougher law than the IOC or virtually any other national Olympic committee.

Asked if the BOA would consider falling into line the IOC, Moynihan replied: “We are aware that for 16 years we have taken a very tough line and the feeling has been to take into account what the athletes want.

“The IOC have now made a major move in the direction of the BOA, WADA have toughened up their position and with the High Court decision I think the tide has turned in our favor.”

Moynihan said he was not jubilant to have won as Chambers’ actions had damaged Olympic sport.

“I’m clearly pleased that the bylaw stays in place and is respected by the courts, but it’s a matter for regret that our best sprinter has put himself out of the running to shine in Beijing purely by his own actions,” Moynihan said.

“We have however sent a powerful message that serious drug offenders will not be part of Team GB.”

Chambers is unlikely to appeal against the decision and the 30-year-old’s lawyer Nick Collins said his client was very disappointed by the result.

“The difficulty of challenging the rules of a governing body was always going to be a tough,” Collins said.

Reaction among former and current Olympic athletes was one of relief that the bylaw had been upheld.

Colin Jackson, the former 110m hurdles silver medallist, said:

“I’m really happy Dwain has lost his appeal,” former 110-meter hurdles silver medallist Colin Jackson said. “This is more about a principle than anything else and the decision has sent out a clear message that we are not going to accept people in our team who have committed offenses such as this.”

“Dwain, get on with your life, whatever that might be - we don’t want you in our team.”

Jo Pavey, a strong candidate for a medal in the Olympic 10,000 meters, also agreed with Chamers exclusion, believing that it sent the right message prior to London hosting the 2012 Games in four years time.

“If they had let him run in Beijing it would have sent out the wrong message to youngsters in the sport as we prepare to stage the Games in London,” Pavey said.

“It is also good news for clean athletes who in the past have had to battle against the drug cheats. Who knows if he is still benefiting now from what he took. You can’t be sure.”

Updated: 2008-07-09

(BEIJING, July 9) — “Though sports, we can bring peace”, Chungwon Choue, President of the World Taekwondo Federation (WTF), recently told the IOC President Jacques Rogge and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

The WTF launched the Taekwondo Peace Corps in Suwon, the Republic of Korea on July 5. Choue hopes that if successful, the Taekwondo Peace Corps will be expanded into the “Sports Peace Corps”, with the purpose of improving sports in developing countries.

“If the Taekwondo Peace Corps project is carried out successfully, then we will expand the program to involve all Olympic sports into a ‘Sport Peace Corps’ program, in cooperation with the United Nations and the IOC,” said Choue.

Seven Taekwondo Peace Corps teams will be sent to five countries by the WTF this summer. The destinations are Russia, Paraguay, India, Pakistan and China. Two teams will go to India and China.

Sport struggles to bridge Korean divide

By Peter Rutherford

SEOUL (Reuters) - While ping pong diplomacy worked wonders for China-U.S. relations, sport and politics have made for uncomfortable bedfellows on the Korean peninsula.

A half-century has passed since armistice brought the 1950-53 Korean conflict to a close but despite a significant thaw in relations in recent years the prospects for reunification of the capitalist South and communist North remain remote.

Efforts to harness the Olympics as a tool for reconciliation have met with some success and the two Koreas should once again march under a single flag at the Beijing opening ceremony on August 8, though they were unable to thrash out an agreement to compete as a joint team.

At other sporting events, progress has been patchy.

On June 22, a soccer World Cup qualifier between the two passed off without incident in a genuinely warm atmosphere in Seoul but three months earlier their first game had been moved from Pyongyang to Shanghai due to a diplomatic row.

North Korea refused to play the South’s national anthem or raise its flag, forcing FIFA to step in and switch the match to a neutral venue.

For the athletes, political issues should be a secondary consideration to success, said South Korea’s most successful female archer Kim Soo-nyung.

Kim, who earned four gold medals between 1988 and 2000, faced a North Korean for the individual archery bronze in Sydney at a time when relations between Seoul and Pyongyang were improving.

“There was talk about whether I should let her win,” she told Reuters. “If politics was the main priority I guess I could have.

“But what matters in sport is the result. I did my best as an athlete, won the bronze and the North Korean didn’t win anything. That’s sport.”

SYMBOLIC GESTURES

The two Koreas have found it easier to compromise on the Olympic stage and analysts say even symbolic sporting gestures could reap rewards given the current state of North-South relations.

Pyongyang has delivered particularly stinging criticism of the South’s new conservative president, Lee Myung-bak.

“North and South Korea marching together at opening ceremonies might be symbolic but with tension running so high between the two governments now the march at the Beijing Games may even play a role in improving ties,” said Yoo Ho-yeol, a North Korea expert at Korea University.

The Olympics have no equal in terms of profile and prestige, focusing the attention of the world on the host nation.

Former South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan hoped hosting the 1988 Games in Seoul would showcase the country’s ‘economic miracle’ and deliver legitimacy to his authoritarian regime.

Instead, with the world and International Olympic Committee (IOC) watching, South Koreans protested their way to democracy, forcing Chun to step down. The Korean strongman’s reaction to pro-democracy demonstrations might have been very different without the fate of the Olympics hanging over his head.

MISSED OPPORTUNITY

While the 1988 Olympics helped South Korea to become a genuine global player, they might also have widened the rift with the North, which demanded to co-host the Games.

South Korea rejected the North’s demand but negotiations with the IOC eventually led to an offer for North Korea to host several events, including archery and table tennis. The then IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch called it “a very generous proposal, an historic one.”

North Korea rejected the idea. Along with Cuba, Ethiopia and Nicaragua, it boycotted the 1988 Olympics, while South Korea hosted one of the most memorable Games.

“The Seoul Olympic Games and the North’s boycott raised the South’s stature in the international community,” said North Korea expert Yoo. “At the same time it deepened the North’s isolation.”

Those Games featured the infamous Ben Johnson doping affair, Roy Jones Jr’s highly disputed loss to a South Korean boxer, Greg Louganis smashing his head on a diving board and gold-medal performances from Florence Griffith Joyner and Steffi Graf.

Seoul also saw Russian and U.S. athletes compete against each other following the boycotts of Moscow in 1980 and Los Angeles four years later.

While Seoul’s experience showed the enormous impact of the Olympics, analysts believe the scrutiny associated with the Beijing Games will not force China to up the pace of change.

“When it made the bid in 2001, China pledged to clean up on the environment and human rights and make political reforms,” said Shin Sang-jin, a China expert at Seoul’s Kwangwoon University.

“It has done so to a certain degree but the leadership is not going to go as far as to put the question of its sovereignty and loss of its authority with the public on the line.”

(Additional reporting by Jack Kim, Editing by Clare Fallon)

Volleyball player Scott-Arruda makes fourth Olympics

By Simon Lewis PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

NEW YORK (TICKER) —Danielle Scott-Arruda will head into the fourth Olympic volleyball tournament of her career believing the depth of this year’s USA roster will be the key to its success in Beijing.

Scott-Arruda, 35, was one of 12 players nominated by USA Volleyball and head coach ‘Jenny’ Lang Ping on Wednesday to represent the United States at the 2008 Games next month. She is also one of eight with previous Olympic experience.

“I am overly elated to be selected to my fourth Olympic Games,” Scott-Arruda said. “It was an emotional moment for all of us, though, to be selected.

“Jenny called us in by groups to tell us who was selected. It was an awesome moment when my name was called. We really have a dynamic group selected at every position on the court that will help us succeed in the Olympics.”

Middle blocker Scott-Aruda competed in the 1996, 2000 and 2004 Games and her fourth Olympic team selection ties the USA Volleyball record with Tara Cross-Battle, who played in her fourth Olympics in 2004.

Players selected to their third Olympic Games include setter Robyn Ah Mow-Santos, outside hitter Logan Tom, middle blocker Heather Bown and libero Stacy Sykora (Burleson, Texas). Opposite Tayyiba Haneef-Park, setter Lindsey Berg and outside hitter Ogonna Nnamani all return from the 2004 Athens roster.

Newcomers to an Olympic squad are outside hitters Kim Glass and Kim Willoughby, middle blocker Jennifer Joines and libero Nicole Davis.

Beijing native Lang Ping will be participating in her third Games having led the Chinese team to a 1984 Olympic gold medal in Los Angeles and coached the Chinese Olympic Team to a silver in 1996 in Atlanta.

The 2008 USA roster is virtually the same one that won bronze at last year’s FIVB World Cup and earned the Americans their spot in this summer’s Olympics.

The U.S. Women are currently ranked fourth in the world by FIVB, the international governing body of volleyball, having recently finished fourth at the FIVB World Grand Prix final tournament in Yokohama, Japan. The team has been grouped in Pool A at the Olympics with host China, Cuba, Japan, Poland and Venezuela.

Team USA opens on August 9 against Japan before facing Cuba two days later, then Venezuela (August 13), China (August 15) and Poland (August 17) to conclude pool play.

GOLF: The International Golf Federation (IGF) has formed an Olympic Golf Committee to drive its effort for the sport’s inclusion in the 2016 Games, it announced this week.

The IGF is recognized as the representative body for golf by the International Olympic Committee and organizations that will be represented on the committee are The R&A, PGA European Tour, USGA, PGA of America, PGA TOUR, LPGA and Augusta National Golf Club.

At an IGF press conference at this week’s Open Championship venue Royal Birkdale Golf Club, PGA TOUR executive Ty Votaw was introduced as the person who will coordinate the effort, and he will serve in a newly created position as Executive Director, IGF Olympic Golf Committee.

Votaw and his fellow committee members have until October 2009, when the International Olympic Committee votes on which, if any, sports to add.

“There is a significant amount of work to be done between now and next October, when the IOC makes its decision,” PGA TOUR Commissioner Tim Finchem said. “As the PGA TOUR considers this a very important initiative on behalf of the international golf community, we are pleased to provide Ty and the majority of his time to coordinate this effort.”

Golf is one of seven sports under consideration, along with baseball, karate, roller sports, rugby sevens, softball and squash. No more than two of these can be added when the IOC votes.

If successful, golf would become an Olympic sport for the first time since 1904, when it was contested in St. Louis. At that time, men’s individual and team titles were contested among 77 golfers representing just two nations - 74 from the United States and three from Canada.

“Without question, golf’s international popularity has grown significantly over the past couple of decades and the sport continues to expand and develop in new countries,” Votaw said. “So the time is right to champion golf as an Olympic sport.

“It’s wonderful that this has become such a united effort among golf’s leading organizations. I’m excited about this opportunity and very much look forward to the challenge and, hopefully, reward of bringing golf back to the Olympics.”

The 121st IOC session in Copenhagen, Denmark, at which the vote will be taken will also determine the host city for the 2016 Games with Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro, and Tokyo the four finalists.

TRACK & FIELD: Beijing-bound runners Catherine Ndereba, Benita Johnson, Hendrick Ramaala, and Madaí Pérez have been added to the field for the NYC Half-Marathon Presented by NIKE on June 27, race organizers New York Road Runners announced Wednesday.

The international athletes will join the previously announced two-time USA Olympian Dathan Ritzenhein and fellow Americans James Carney, Zoila Gómez, and four-time Olympian Colleen De Reuck for the third annual 13.1-mile race from Central Park to Battery Park.

Kenya’s Ndereba is the reigning IAAF World Championships Marathon women’s champion while of her female rivals, Johnson of Australia is a former IAAF World Cross Country Championships winner and Pérez is the Mexican marathon record holder.

Ritzenhein and Carney, meanwhile, will face a stiff challenge from Hendrick Ramaala of South Africa, the 2004 ING New York City Marathon winner.

“Even more than a major international race, this year’s NYC Half provides a pre-game glimpse at some of our sport’s favorites as they head into Beijing,” New York Road Runners president and CEO Mary Wittenberg said.

Also added to the field are Kenyan duo Patrick Makau and Felix Limo.

Makau, 23, captured the Healthy Kidney 10K crown in Central Park in May, and will return to New York looking to extend his four-race winning streak at half-marathon distance.

Limo, 27, is one of the world’s top marathon runners, with major victories at Berlin (2004), Chicago (2005), and London (2006).

BASKETBALL: Mike Krzyzewski’s Team USA’s pre-Olympic exhibition schedule is to be televised live by ESPN, USA Basketball announced Thursday.

The USA men’s senior national team, including Carmelo Anthony, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Jason Kidd among others, has a five-game tune-up schedule, beginning Friday, July 25, against Canada at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN.

Coach K’s roster then transfers to China for four games against the 2008 USA Basketball Men’s Select Team, which was announced on Wednesday and includes 10 top young NBA players.

The USA Basketball International Challenge games are scheduled for July 31-August 5 in Macao and Shanghai and will be televised live on ESPN 2, which will also re-air them.

The senior men’s roster heads to Beijing the following day with Olympic competition running August 10-24. Team USA opens against host China on August 10 at 10:15 a.m. ET.

USA Basketball Senior National Team: Carmelo Anthony (Denver Nuggets); Carlos Boozer (Utah Jazz); Chris Bosh (Toronto Raptors); Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers); Dwight Howard (Orlando Magic); LeBron James (Cleveland Cavaliers); Jason Kidd (Dallas Mavericks); Chris Paul (New Orleans Hornets); Tayshaun Prince (Detroit Pistons); Michael Redd (Milwaukee Bucks); Dwyane Wade (Miami Heat); Deron Williams (Utah Jazz).

Head coach: Mike Krzyzewski (Duke University)

USA Basketball Select Team: LaMarcus Aldridge (Portland Trail Blazers); Kevin Durant (Oklahoma City); Jeff Green (Oklahoma City); Luther Head (Houston Rockets); Al Horford (Atlanta Hawks); Andre Iguodala (Philadelphia 76ers); Kevin Martin (Sacramento Kings); O.J. Mayo (Memphis Grizzlies); Derrick Rose (Chicago Bulls) and Rodney Stuckey (Detroit Pistons).

Two players from NBA Summer League will be added.

Head coach: P.J. Carlesimo (Oklahoma City)

Updated: 2008-07-10

(Hong Kong, July 9) — Hong Kong is able to ensure the safe and comfortable arrival of horses, International Olympic Committee (IOC) personnel and spectators from around the world in Hong Kong for the Olympic Equestrian events to be held this summer, an official said on Wednesday.

This is due to the excellent cooperation between the airport and the Equestrian Company and because of rehearsals that have taken place over the last few months, said Carrie Yau, deputy secretary-general of the Hong Kong Home Affairs Bureau, according to Xinhua.

Yau made the remarks after inspecting reception and security matters at the airport. Horses will be arriving in Hong Kong beginning July 26, it was reported.

Yau urged relevant agencies to continue rehearsing and to prepare efficient and appropriate measures to cope with any unexpected circumstances.

“With the Equestrian events less than one month away, we will make periodic inspections over the progress in the preparatory work, including transport, security, flow of people, quarantine and volunteer training to make sure that everything is ok,” she said.

Russian baseball in danger of striking out

By Gennady Fyodorov

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Baseball’s exclusion from the Olympic programme after Beijing could make the game extinct in Russia just as it was starting to flourish.

“I really fear that baseball will soon die as a sport in this country,” Russian baseball federation vice-president Dmitry Kiselev told Reuters in an interview.

“In Russia, most of the money is spent on sports that are part of the Olympic programme, others get very little, and since we didn’t qualify for Beijing in baseball or softball the funding will be cut drastically,” he said.

“Unlike some other sports that can attract wealthy private sponsors, baseball doesn’t have enough interest among the public to survive on its own without financial aid from the state.”

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted in 2005 to remove baseball and softball from the Games programme after this year.

Russians started to develop baseball in the mid-1980s after the IOC decided to make it a medals sport in the Olympics from the 1992 Barcelona Games.

“The Soviet sports committee ordered officials to take up the game in 1986,” recalled 37-year-old Kiselev, who also coaches and plays outfield for the Moscow State University team.

“Three years later, thanks to a Japanese businessman, the first baseball stadium was built in Moscow. By the mid-1990s we had our first successes on the international stage, at least in Europe,” said the coach, who guided Russia to a bronze medal at the European under-18 baseball championship in 1996.

At 25, he became the youngest person ever to receive the Merited Coach award, the country’s highest sporting honor.

FIRST BASE

“During our tours to the United States in the 1990s the Americans were curious to know how well we were adapting to their game and I would often read the headlines ‘Russians are inching towards first base’,” he recalled.

“But I’d say we had reached first base a long time ago. Our problem, it seems, is that we can’t get to home plate, no matter how hard we try,” added the Muscovite, who also works as a department head of Rossport, a federal agency overseeing the development and financing of all sports in Russia.

Ironically, Kiselev himself has dealt a heavy blow to his favorite game by axing it from the Spartakiad, a biannual Olympic-style youth competition.

“At Rossport, I’m responsible for the Spartakiad programme so I had no choice but to drop baseball since it will not be a part of the Olympics after Beijing,” he said.

“So we’ll have even fewer young people interested in taking up the game. It’s a very sad ending because baseball really had a chance to become one of the main sports in our country.”

Russia has fewer than 600 registered players nationwide and only 10 teams, which are split into two divisions.

“We also have teams in the Far East region that play against amateur clubs from Japan and South Korea,” said Kiselev, adding that baseball would have prospered under the old communist system when a government decree was all that was needed.

“In a way, we were unlucky as we ran out of time,” he said.

“I think if the Soviet system had lasted another five years, then we would probably see baseball on a different level than it is today,” he added, drawing a parallel with the rise of ice hockey in this country some 60 years ago.

RUSSIAN HOCKEY

The Russians were introduced to ice hockey following World War Two and soon afterwards they adopted the game as their own.

They called it “Canadian hockey” to distinguish from bendy or “Russian hockey,” a game played with a small orange ball on a football pitch covered with ice that was very popular in the Soviet Union and Scandinavia.

“Hockey quickly found a niche here and soon became so popular it became a part of Russian culture,” Kiselev said.

“Baseball could have had a similar success here if it was given enough time to develop.”

Some experts argue that baseball would never become popular in Russia because of its complex rules, long intervals in play, untranslatable terminology and meticulous pre-pitch rituals.

“It’s just not in Russian people’s nature to get excited about such strange sports like baseball. We like fast-moving games like football and hockey,” said one Russian soccer coach.

Kiselev, who comes from a sporting family, disagrees.

“Although baseball is considered an American game, Russians for centuries have played a similar game called lapta,” said Kiselev, who like many of his peers took up baseball by chance.

“Both my father and grandfather played lapta and when I first saw baseball I liked it. I guess it was in my genes.”

His father Alexei was one of Russia’s top boxers, winning two Olympic silver medals as a light heavyweight in 1964 and 1968, while his brother Alexei Jr. played professional soccer.

“Our father wanted me and my brother to become all-round athletes so he introduced us to various sports,” he said.

“One day I was going to a boxing gym when I first saw people playing baseball. I was so intrigued by the game I was hooked.”

(Editing by Clare Fallon)