Emotions were as fertile as the points were long in Paris for the biggest clay court event of the year, the French Open. Serena and Venus dominated the women?s field, and their increasing dominance of the sport left a somewhat bittersweet taste after their spotty final. And the issue of doping in tennis came into the light of day, thanks to a handful of outraged French players.
Williams hegemony in women?s tennis
As prophesied by their father Richard, the Williams sisters have become the dominant force in women?s tennis. This week, Venus and Serena Williams are 1 and 2 in the official tour rankings, for the first but certainly not the last time, and two of the last three Grand Slam finals have been all-Williams affairs.
While their unequalled combination of speed and power has for the past few years been the principal force on hard courts and grass, clay has often tripped the sisters up in years past. In fact, neither Venus nor Serena had been past the quarterfinals in any previous French Open. This year was of course a different story, as their power has been harnessed in a way that it is less likely to break down even on the slower surfaces. The Williamses encountered little serious opposition on their way to the fin
al.
Serena?s closest call came in her semifinal with Jennifer Capriati, the defending champion and perhaps the only player whose brute force is in the Williams league. Capriati had Serena in trouble, as the 3-6, 7-6, (7-2), 6-2 scoreline suggests. But at key moments of the match it was clear that Jennifer had lost the mental edge to the more confident Williams (?I?m choking!?, cried out the anguished Capriati as she blundered her way through the crucial second set tie-break). Monica Seles, though game as a
lways, lacked the physical resources to pose much of a threat to Venus in their key quarterfinal. And as for players who might have posed a stern challenge, such as Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters, they were early round casualties, stumbling against the kind of lesser opponents whom Venus and Serena now make a habit of pummelling.
Yes, the sisters ride atop the sport. The downside of this is of course is that they will increasingly play one another in major finals, contests that inevitably degenerate into strangely sloppy affairs of interest mainly to the armchair psychologists and conspiracy theorists among us. Those observers who feel that their matches are pre-ordained are fewer in number these days, although they can still be found. The only thing we know for sure is that their standard of play when they face each other, for
whatever reason, is abysmal (?unadulterated tripe? was the way one British journalist judged the final), and does credit neither to the women?s game nor to their own talent.
Perhaps fortunately, they show no signs of abandoning their practice of arranging their schedule such that they rarely meet outside the major events.
EPO doping creates a stir
Doping is an issue that bedevils many sports. Athletes around the world who don?t have ethical problems with taking ?short cuts? attempt to get an edge by resorting to performance-enhancing substances, many of which are banned by sporting authorities. At the French Open, the doping issue was first raised in quiet whispers before being blown into the light of day by a French newspaper article that shook the sport.
Most of the early whispering revolved around Guillermo Cañas, the Argentine who was amazingly tireless in four-hour-plus victories over 1998 Roland Garros champion Carlos Moya and top seed Lleyton Hewitt. After Hewitt?s fourth round loss to Cañas, a reporter bravely asked aloud what many others might have been thinking: ?After a match like this, it's never crossed your mind that two Argentinians were caught for doping?? Hewitt answered, ?Hasn't even crossed my mind??
The issue of doping blew wide open on June 5, the second Wednesday in the tournament, in articles published by the daily newspaper Le Parisien. Leading French players railed against the ATP, and the ATP?s CEO Mark Miles in particular, for contenting themselves with an incomplete and insufficently systematic drug testing program and administering short, three-month sentences for offenders.
Of particular concern is erythropoietin (EPO), an hormone that occurs naturally in the body but that when administered in sufficient quantity allows the athlete?s blood to carry more oxygen, increasing his or her endurance.
Primarily because of its rampant abuse in the cycling world, tests have been developed to detect EPO. But this is not one of the tests administered in tennis. According to the Le Parisien article, the ATP justifies this by claiming that tennis does not require a large intake of oxygen. "It's scandalous to say that", responded French Davis Cupper Fabrice Santoro. The French players are particularly sensitive to the EPO issue, because they are obliged by their national authorities to undergo blood tests
designed to detect EPO, tests that athletes of most other countries can avoid.
Santoro?s countryman Nicolas Escudé went further, implying that some players, primarily American, object to the anti-EPO blood tests for specious reasons. ?When I hear Andy Roddick say that there's no way he'll let himself be injected for a blood test, that annoys me. When I hear that the Americans don't want to get needles because they are Jehovah's Witnesses or whatever, I say, don't take me for a fool.? And Escudé clearly laid the blame at the feet of the ATP bosses, also American. ?It's an entire
mafia that's in place,? railed the French player. The ATP?s Miles showed no sympathy for these criticisms, which he termed ?ill-informed, irresponsible and offensive? in a terse communiqué.
Where the ATP (and WTA, for that matter) do not wish to go, however, the ITF (International Tennis Federation), may drag them. The day after the French Open concluded, French Tennis Federation president Christian Bimes said that the ITF, which governs the Grand Slams, Davis Cup and Fed Cup, will probably institute EPO testing in 2003.
Sadly, the doping war is a fight that is never definitively won, as new drugs and masking substances are constantly being tried. The top tennis players are wealthy, and have access to the same ?advisers? who lead athletes in other sports down the doping path. The least tennis can do is give the appearance that it is in the forefront of this fight.