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Millennium Olympics Closed with Piles of World Records against Doping Cheats
Against a blue sky, the Millennium Olympic Games smoothly came to an ending note with great successes as 15 world records were outdated in 13 swimming events, six by the Netherlands, four by both the United States and Australia, and one by Ukraine.
Inge de Bruijn and Pieter van den Hoogenband, the Dutch Darling and Wonder Boy, each smashed triple world records in the swimming pool, whereas the United States emerged as the lonely dominating superpower against the world by taking 14 out of the 33 gold medals as the men's 50m freestyle produced the first-ever double golds in the Olympic men's swimming history.
Winning the Olympic gold medals has always been the ultimate goal of all the Olympians, and inking their names with dignity into the world record books will forever be cherished as a lifetime blessing for their devotion to the sports.
While only strict scientific criteria can rule "Kings and Queens" against the cheaters and fakes, IOC executive member Jacques Rogge of Belgium bravely revealed the puzzles behind the great successes.
"One goes with the other," Rogge said, "The rich countries have a sophisticated doping system, the poor countries have no sophisticated doping system, that's as simple as that."
"You have the very sophisticated doping, mostly by very rich countries where you can have doctors around who are specialists, and anonymous checks in labs to know if you're clean," he said, " Then you have the second tier in not well-to-do countries where athletes do it on an individual basis. They grab (drugs) that are easy to grab."
The world records in the pool stand out. So do 400m winner Aboriginal Cathy Freeman. So do nandrolone and ephedrine. So do EPO (Erythropoletin) and HGH (Human Growth Hormone) whereas most cheaters in developing countries still seek for anabolic steroids as well as stimulants and diuretics.
In a sharp contrast, the athletics competitions, with a same amount of 32 golds at stake, were concluded in short of any world record by the best athletes in the world, although the United States remained to be the best to reap 10 gold medals, namely three less than that in Atlanta.
Marion Jones was dazzled in her dream of becoming the first to win five golds, eventually had to settle for an individual double in the 100m and 200m besides a 4x400m relay gold, while her husband C.J. Hunter became the first American to be kicked out of the Millennium Olympics for four-time failures in doping tests.
From the historic Olympics, the United States remained to be a lonely top placer with 39 gold medals, as Russia kept the distance with 32 for the second place, without winning a single gold from the pool as its swimming legend Alexander Popov was beaten all the time for a silver medal only.
China, with 28 golds for a total of 59, has made a historic leap into the top three in the gold tally, with envious harvest from its traditional strongholds of table tennis, badminton, diving and women's weightlifting.
And the friendly hosts Australia also has the best to cherish as they finished in the fourth place with 16 golds, beating Germany and France to fifth and sixth respectively, with four world records broken in the pool by Klim Michael, Ian Thorpe and their relay teams.
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