Asterisk*

Track and Field has started. Unless you live under a rock, I’m sure you are aware of that. You are also probably keenly aware of the huge cloud of skepticism that covers the sports these days. You are not able to watch a race, read an article, or listen to coverage without hearing a reference to performance enhancing, doping, steroids, or something in that category. Everything has an asterisk. What has happened in our sport over the last few years has been extremely detrimental and it is no more evident than here at the Games, usually the one place where Track and Field is able to shine. But now a huge cloud of suspicion subdues that shine.

And perhaps it is all justified. Everything that has gone on and been uncovered makes it hard to see the purity anymore. You can’t look at an excellent performance and see only that—your mind immediately deems it improbable of someone being able to accomplish a great feat clean. And if your mind hasn’t begun that process yet, the media will make sure it has by the end of these Olympics. I’m sure of it. At first I wasn’t so sure of the media’s effect on the changing perception of our athletes and track in general. I knew that as athletes and people in the “know” about our sport and what types of things seem plausible and what sorts of behaviors are believable, we would probably have a different opinion on things then perhaps the general public would. It’s like the family down the street with the white picket fence that still has two parents, 2.5 kids, and a dog named Benji. Well…maybe not. We really haven’t been the perfect poster child but we like to keep our dirty laundry under wraps as much as possible. There is still a lot of good in our sport as well as a lot of amazing athletes. If people don’t believe in that, they lose interest. There is a reason we saw swimming “LIVE” during prime time and Track and Field on a time delay so by the time you actually saw the races you’ve already encountered a myriad of headlines screaming the results. We’ve lost our luster and people just aren’t as interested in a sport full of drug cheats.

But it is still a great sport with many, many fantastic athletes capable of extraordinary things. And the problem now is that the general public just isn’t that discerning. All they know is phenomenal more than likely equals performance enhancing. Most of our recent exceptional stars have seemed to be phonies and this is the problem you encounter with a sport that has chosen such few faces to represent it. So now the whole sport will suffer. Perhaps rightly so in some ways, I don’t really know. I have my own cynicisms and have become a huge skeptic as of late myself but I still choose to not let it get out of hand as much as possible. I know that there are people out there capable of remarkable things and I still want to be able to appreciate that. And I want the general public to be able to do the same.

Today as I was eating lunch I overheard the next table over talking about the Olympics and specifically about what has happened on the track the last couple of days. There have been some FAST races, in case you have been occupied with other things. And the first thing they mentioned was that so and so must be “juiced.” They don’t know much about the sport I’m sure, but they do know that fast people can’t be fast without help these days supposedly. It was a bit depressing to overhear that because I know that many people share that sentiment these days. But people can still be fast. Really fast. I don’t have the ability to vouch for anybody or tell you who to believe in for sure (except me of course), but there are still many amazing athletes out there and they need and appreciate the support.