Sprinter Marion Jones admitted using steroids

This is an utter shame.

Joe(....)Nation

I feel sorry for her. Especially after seeing EDIT: MODERATOR: LINK REMOVED Having done nutritional programs for athletes I can tell you that many don't know what they are taking. Many of them have no interest in learning about nutrition, why would they if there's a nutrition professional advising them on their meals and feeding them supplements? I am glad to see the awareness of steroid abuse increase. I hope it leads to people being more aware of what substances of all kinds they are putting into them, including ones built into their food.

When she was protected, she did a lot of bragging about her innocence. Her husband, a 330 lbs shot putter had to leave the Sydney Olympics because he was full of steroids. In a household like that, there is no such thing as being clean.
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She had an attack of honesty, years after all that glory. I feel sorry for the clean athletes who won and were given a silver or bronze medal.
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Let's face it, the Olympics are a circus that has lost all the idealism of the past.
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Until now, Jones had denied doping, even suing BALCO founder Victor Conte in 2004 for $25 million. Conte repeatedly accused Jones of using performance-enhancing drugs and said he watched her inject herself.

It really is shameful and I agree with noinpo. It was very, very hard to believe her steadfast claims of innocence when her husband was booted out of the games but you want to believe in an athlete's sense of honor and integrity, even when common sense tells you not to.
Shameful. Now she'll lose her medals but, I guess, she'll have a clean conscience.

this is shocking.... I feel so... ambivalent...

There will always be cheaters, some people have no sense of honesty.
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Rosie Ruiz Vivas (born 1953, Havana, Cuba) is a Cuban American runner who on April 21, 1980 ostensibly came in as the first place female competitor in the 84th Boston Marathon with a record time of 2:31:56. However, race officials determined that she had not completed the entire 26.2-mile course, but had registered for the race and later jumped in from the crowd and sprinted to the finish.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosie_Ruiz

Geez. I remember that.

is it true that Jones' teammates are going to have to give back their medals too???

if that is true i feel bad for those other 3 runners

I think she's pathetic - but she aint alone in that. I hope she has as much public squirming to do as Ben Johnson did.

As Melinda Gainsford-Taylor said, "If you are taking drugs and lining up and getting on the podium, you're obviously comfortable with lying."

Well, folks, the problem is, this is all likely widespread, and like catching the fox while suspecting them in the henhouse.

Almost like the person actually caught is the victim. And not, of course, just steroids, also blood components. The additives have become, as I read it, part of the culture.

Having read sports stories from early days in US sportswriting, I cringe. Though there was a lot of drama back then too.

I can see one person outed as (oh!), but there is a context for all this.

It seems increasingly unlikely that a purist could just get to the pinacle of sports, whatever contest, without additives.

I don't know what to say about that. I think we did have some past where additives were not only illegal but tacky. Sometimes it has been near funny (memories of some east german female swimmers.)

But, for me, all that is anti sport.

A new and upsetting twist in the Jones Saga. If the relay team mates are innocent, they should state their feelings in public.
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If they are guilty as well, they should hide and be ashamed.
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October 09, 2007
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THE United States has urged its 2000 Olympic women's relay teams to hand back their medals after one of the members, Marion Jones, confessed to steroid use.
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"We do not think that the relay medals were won fairly and we urge the athletes to return their medals," said United States Olympic Committee (USOC) chairman Peter Ueberroth in a teleconference on Monday.

Ueberroth said USOC did not have the power to force the athletes to return the medals because the issue was within the sole jurisdiction of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
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"We don't have jurisdiction in that matter. If we did, we would be on the side of returning the medals," said Ueberroth.
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The US won gold in the 4x400 metres relay at the Sydney Games ahead of Jamaica, with Russia third and Nigeria fourth.

In addition to Jones, the team included Jearl Miles-Clark, Monique Hennagan and LaTash Colander.
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Jones also helped the U.S win bronze in the 4x100 relay, behind Bahamas and Jamaica and ahead of France. Chryste Gaines, Torri Edwards and Nanceen Perry were the other members of the team.
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Asked what his message would be to Jones's relay team mates Ueberroth said: "It is very unfortunate but your result involved cheating and so you are not entitled to those medals."
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Gaines served a two year ban due to her involvement in the BALCO clinic case which has rocked U.S sport and led to Jones's downfall.
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Edwards was also banned for use of the banned stimulant nikethamide in 2004 and served 15 months of her two-year suspension before the substance was downgraded by the World Anti-Doping Agency.
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On Monday Jones returned her five medals from the 2000 Games, which included three gold medals.
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http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,22556291-12428,00.html

the running mates may be innocent, but would they have won the medal if jones had been clean?

that's the sticky part.

I believed at the time and am convinced to this day that Florence Griffith Joyner (now deceased) used performance enhancing drugs.

How many others? Dunno. But FloJo seemed obvious to me.

Well, she has been sentenced. I hope she sits alone and thinks about all the other athletes who were also-runs because of her cheating.
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Former Olympian Marion Jones was sentenced to six months in jail Friday after admitting she lied to investigators when questioned about her use of steroids and a cheque-fraud scheme.
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U.S. District Judge Kenneth Karas delivered the sentence in White Plains, N.Y., Friday -- three months after Jones submitted her guilty plea.

The disgraced track star received six months for lying about using performance-enhancing drugs and two months -- which will run concurrently -- for the second charge.
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"I ask you to be as merciful as a human being can be,'' said Jones, who cried on her husband's shoulder after the sentencing.
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Karas said he gave the maximum allowed under her plea deal "because of the need for general deterrence and the need to promote respect for the law.''
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http://news.sympatico.msn.ctv.ca/TopStories/ContentPosting.aspx?feedname=CTV-TOPSTORIES_V2&showbyline=True&newsitemid=CTVNews%2F20080111%2FMarion_Jones_080111