Back to the Future: Comments on Sport History´s Contribution to Understanding Existing Anti-Doping Strategies

Jörg Krieger, German Sport University Cologne

The latest revelations of the World Anti-Doping Agency´s (WADA) “Independent Commission Report #1” investigating the doping system in Russia have yet again proven that the current structures to combat doping in sport lack – at least in some countries – efficiency. Often as researchers, we are asked: how can sport history make a relevant contribution to the understanding of such contemporary events? In my opinion, taking a historical approach to sport and to doping and anti-doping issues helps gaining an understanding of the successes and failures of existing anti-doping strategies and practices. Such an approach aims at developing broad and in-depth knowledge about the genesis of the international fight against doping. Understanding history, in other words, helps us understand why anti-doping today is successful, or not, and the tensions within the anti-doping regime internationally. Historical accounts give us clearer insights into the influence of anti-doping’s most important agents, their world views and initiatives they took in turn based on those world views, and the institutionalized strategies that developed as a reflection of those agents’ interests and values. Understanding all of these factors is crucial because they are built into the fabric of today’s anti-doping policies.

Recently I conducted a major study on the influence of scientists in the global fight against doping in sport; a topic that I believe is somewhat overlooked in the historical and sociological sciences [1]. Understanding the role of scientists helps gain insight into anti-doping today. I argue in the study that discussing the scientific perspective of anti-doping history illustrates the significance of personnel involvements and their consequences for the tendencies of anti-doping as a whole.

A very small group of anti-doping laboratory experts heavily influenced the IOC´s anti-doping activities, to the extent that by the 1980s, they controlled much of the decision-making processes. Indeed, this small group of men had a long-lasting effect on the doping control system. The most important protagonists were British pharmacologist Arnold Beckett and German biochemist Manfred Donike, who combined had a decisive impact on the expansion of the IAAF´s and the IOC´s anti-doping activities in the 1970s and 1980s. They achieved this through the implementation of an international network of anti-doping laboratories, the development of ground-breaking analytical procedures, as well as the establishment of educational activities for laboratory workers in order to harmonize the scientific, technical, administrative and organisational procedures. These scientists supported and enforced the growth of the rigid testing regime, which is important to consider when understanding and debating the anti-doping regime in place today.

Both institutional and individual patterns that we have seen exemplified in the “Russian doping scandal” that emerged in 2015 have strong historical precedents. Examples of authorities taking measures to limit the effectiveness of anti-doping are nothing new. For example, the recently revealed attempts by IAAF administrators to withhold analytical results and disrupt the efforts of scientists in their anti-doping efforts appeared unsettling within the world of sport. However, such interventions to deny scientific stakeholders within the IAAF are not new. Historical sources reveal that former IAAF president Primo Nebiolo unsuccessfully attempted to exclude both Arnold Beckett and Manfred Donike from the IAAF Medical Committee in the mid-1980s because he thought them to be too influential and powerful. Indeed, the power struggles between sport administrators and scientists, and for that matter between scientists themselves, have been mainstays of anti-doping since the inception of major anti-doping rules and regulations in the 1960s. These conflicts have driven much of the anti-doping regime. Such historical controversies demonstrate that the recently disclosed disputes are not a modern phenomenon but deeply rooted in the history of sport in general and anti-doping in particular. Hence, sport history supports the processes of understanding the past and present sporting systems.

Moreover, taking an historical approach to sport reveals details of doping and anti-doping history that shed light on continued tensions within the regime today. For example, it is widely known that the first doping controls at the Olympic Games took place during the 1968 Winter Games in Grenoble. However, many are not aware that the first athlete to ever undergo an official doping control at any Olympic Games was the Finnish cross-country skier Eero Mäntyranta, following the men´s 30km cross-country skiing race on 7 February 1968 [1]. This was the first medal competition of the entire Games, staged in Autrans. The IOC Medical Commission, then in charge of the selection, sampling and analytical procedure, had decided that the athletes occupying the first six places, along with four randomly selected competitors had to undergo doping controls at the cross country skiing events. By courtesy of lack of anonymity granted to the athletes, it is apparent that Eero Mäntyranta, who came third in the race, was the first one to give a urine sample: the doping control officers labelled his sample, quite simply, “1 un.” So Mäntyranta, a three-time Olympic champion from the 1960 and 1964 Winter Olympic Games, was the first athlete to undergo a doping test in Olympic history.

But there is a greater point about Mäntyranta that speaks to the challenges within anti-doping history. In 1972, he became the first ever Finish athlete to be tested positive for doping – for amphetamines – and throughout his career he was also suspected of blood doping. But in the 1990s research revealed that he had been born with a genetic mutation that resulted in a 20% higher amount of red blood cells in his body – he held a natural advantage over his competitors, in addition to the ones gained from perseverance and hard training [2]. The Olympic movement’s very first doping test reveals challenges that would become built into the anti-doping regime’s practices over the years: determining what is ‘natural’ versus ‘unnatural’ when it comes to high-performance sport and what constitutes a ‘legitimate’ versus ‘illegitimate’ performance advantage.

In short, while the Russian doping scandal of 2015 may seem like something new, a solid foundation in sport history reveals that it is anything but.

[1] Krieger, J. (2016). Dope Hunters. The Influence of Scientists on the Global Fight against Doping in Sport. Champaign, IL: Common Ground Publishing.

[2] Tännsjö, T. (2005). Commentary.  Journal of Medical Ethics, 3(2), 113.