Hockey has long had a reputation as a sport with a very healthy anti-doping record, and ensuring that athletes are educated in this area is something that the International Hockey Federation (FIH), the Continental Federations and the National Associations take very seriously.
The drive to keep the sport clean remains at the very heart of the FIH’s core values, an objective which reflects the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) mission to lead a collaborative worldwide movement for doping free sport.
WADA’s vision is a world where all athletes can compete in a doping free sporting environment, using the “Play True” tagline which is a guiding principle for all athletes at every level of competition.
At the Hero Hockey World League Final 2015, currently taking place in Raipur, India, we asked the captains of Canada and the Netherlands - two sides that will be in action at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games - about importance of athlete education on anti-doping.
“Obviously it is important to educate athletes, not just in hockey but in any sport”, said Canada captain Scott Tupper, 28. “Hockey is sport which has a clean reputation, with only one or two infractions in its history and it is important that we maintain that record and we have athletes coming through who are competing clean. We certainly feel very well informed about it. Everyone wants to compete on a level playing field, and we want to keep that going forward. Hockey is advancing in terms of the physiological aspects, so the sport needs to make sure that as fitness levels are getting pushed higher and higher that everyone is staying in line with how they go about reaching their peak performance.”
Like his Canadian counterpart, Netherlands captain Robert van der Horst also felt both informed and empowered by the anti-doping message. “I believe that we are very well informed, not just from WADA but also our National Association, which provides us with a lot of information”, said the 31-year-old European champion. “As Scott said, it is very important. The younger you start getting the information about ‘playing true’ the better. It is really important to keep our sport clean, and for the the past few years it has been completely clean.”
Regarding hockey’s excellent record on anti-doping, Van der Horst said: “It is something that we should be proud of because we are playing a fair sport. We all have the common responsibility to make sure our sport stays clean, and we must keep it that way. It is important that experienced players like myself, that have been in the team for a long time, are selling that message to our younger players. We need to have a lot information to ensure that people in hockey do not even think about using drugs to be a better athlete. To be a better athlete and to improve, you need to develop yourself in the gym, not in the lab, and that is an important message.”
Follow all the action from the men's Hero Hockey World League Final in Raipur, India by clicking here.
For more information about WADA, visit their website by clicking here.
Photo: FIH/Getty Images
