Coe Focused on Eliminating Drug Presence at 2012 Olympics

BLACKPOOL, England, October 3. SEBASTIAN Coe, the 1980 and 1984 Olympic champion in the 1500-meter run, is now serving as the Chairman of the London Organizing Committee for the 2012 Games. As part of his duties, Coe is intent on eliminating any drug presence by implementing the toughest tests to nab individuals who go the doping route.

"We have to be a zero tolerance Games," said Coe, a 51-year-old. "It's everything I've stood for, for the last 30 years. I was the first person to speak at an International Olympics Committee (IOC) congress as an athlete about the problems of drugs in sport. We take it very, very seriously. It is absolutely at the centre of everything we believe. Sport is about free, open and fair competition. We want these Games to be for everyone and they cannot be for everyone, particularly as competitors, if you have a small group that decide to cheat."

Coe will be watching the 2008 Games closely as a way to gauge which measures work in terms of catching doping cheats. The Olympic champ indicated that he feels Beijing will go successfully, particularly in the area of hosting an Olympics as free of drugs as possible.

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