Tony Bellew: "DRUG CHEATS should be JAILED for LIFE"

... "if they kill another man in the ring".

He also went on to say that anyone who fails a drug test should be banned for life, no ifs, no buts!

He was being asked if boxing was too soft on drug cheats, with the likes of Povetkin and Ortiz failing multiple tests but just getting a slap on the wrist.

They start talking about PEDs at 34min30secs in this podcast:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05whhnz

Of course, this isn't the first time Tony Bellew has been outspoken about drugs in boxing, here he is last October:

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You tell 'em Tony!

 

Yeah, I'd agree with that, as long as they are closely monitored and they're not being abused throughout training camps to help aid recovery times.

Another thing that needs looking at is the 'therapeutic use exemptions' (TUEs). If the Olympics scandal has shown us anything, it is that a lot more top athletes than previously thought are LEGALLY being prescribed performance enhancing drugs for phantom ailments from their doctor. I find it strange that all these world class athletes seem to be suffering from asthma, heart defects, ADHD and all the rest of it...

Who knows how bad the problem is in boxing, but there should be no exemptions, you fight with the tools god gave you, and if you really do have a heart defect or asthma then you have to make a choice... either the sport or the drugs... you can't have both!

 

I'd throw them in jail for fraud. Maybe not for life, but I'd give them something. And make them repay every penny they have ever earned, and distribute it back to all the competitors they have cheated out of future career earnings.

 

I'm not too familiar with the Chris Frome case, but certainly someone like Bradley Wiggins, who was taking medication for asthma just before he competed, and this medication should only be used if you are having the most severe asthma attack. And it is the same substance that other athletes have been banned for. Clearly, in my view, him and his team found a legal way of abusing the rules with the help of a doctor's note.

With sport supplements, I think athletes have to be extra vigilant, maybe the companies who manufacture these supplements should be able to apply to have their product approved by a drug's agency, and any sportsmen who takes unapproved supplements will have no excuses.

I would really allow for very, very few exemptions. Maybe just for pain relief for boxers as another poster mentioned earlier, as long as it isn't abused.

 

The guy who cheated on "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" (the UK version), he was convicted of fraud, can't remember if he did any jail time, or just got a suspended sentence, but either way, if a man can be convicted for cheating in a gameshow, where no one really got hurt, no careers were ruined, why can't the same be true in sports where you are literally taking other people's livelihoods away from them?

If it can't legally be done, then the laws should be changed.

 

I'm not excusing what Charles Ingram did, but he only cheated on one night, it was more opportunistic than a plan laid out weeks beforehand. Of course he should face the legal consequences, but a sportsman who has cheated their entire career is just as much a professional fraudster in my book, in fact they are worse! Puzzles me why there seems to be a legal distinction here, where one person can be charged for fraud but the sportsman never is.

I agree Lance Armstrong did a lot of good for charity, and I think the judge should take this into consideration when handing him his sentence!