After urging from Beckie Scott, WADA says it will 're-analyze' October doping report

Beckie Scott believes the idea of clean sport is at a crossroads.

A recent letter she addressed to World Anti-Doping Agency president Sir Craig Reedie was a renewed statement pleading for the organization to further investigate other sporting codes in Russia based on an independent report released in October last year.

Scott, chair of the WADA Athletes’ Committee, said from Alberta that the report revealed systematic doping practises at all levels and concluded that it was highly likely it wasn’t evident in just athletics.

“We were really surprised when the report came out that action wasn’t taken to really delve deeper into what is going on there and especially to look at other sports,” she said. “It just feels like if we really stand for clean sports and if we really believe clean athletes is the heart of the games, what more needs to be done to prompt very serious action. This report was very comprehensive, very thorough and incriminating and nothing was done.”

Scott said athletes have been counting on the legitimacy of WADA for a long time and the issue has reached a critical turning point.

“Either we are for clean sport or we’re not. And athletes who are clean and want to see their playing fields level are watching. They are standing by,” she said. “They are wanting our sport administrations and bodies to do the right thing.”

From a WADA symposium in Lausanne, Switzerland, WADA president Craig Reedie said he would "re-analyze" the report to see if new cases were needed, his comments coming some four months after the independent report was conducted. Funding for investigations has been an ongoing issue for the world anti-doping organization which has an annual operating budget of $26 million. This comes at a time too when WADA has called for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics test samples to be re-examined using new test methods.

Scott said this year could be a defining year in sport but that sports organizations and governing bodies must do what they can to strop drug cheats.

“Clean sport is a fundamental value in society. We try to instil it in our children at an early age. It’s not right to cheat. It doesn’t pay to take short cuts. And to play the game you need to play by the rules,” she said. “Cheating, doping and breaking the rules it just changes the whole nature of sport. Like crime, we need to take a stand to push back for what’s right.”