ROME (AP) IOC President Thomas Bach urged national Olympic committees Friday to weed out drug cheats before the Winter Games in Sochi in February, warning that a positive test would taint the image of an entire team.
"Please, speak with your national anti-doping agencies. Speak with your governments. Speak with your national federations," Bach said in a speech to the European Olympic Committees general assembly. "And perform pre-competition testing and make sure that you, as national Olympic committees, that you can be proud of your team in the end.
"You can win as many medals as you want in the Olympic Games," Bach added. "But if you have a doping case by one of your successful athletes, the image of your (entire) team is tainted ... So it is in your own interest to arrive in Sochi with clean athletes."
Bach said pre-competition tests for the Feb. 7-23 Sochi Games have been increased by 57 percent and overall tests will be up by 40 percent from the last Winter Olympics in Vancouver in 2010.
"So we really want to make a great effort with regard to anti-doping with quantity and even more important quality," said Bach, who was elected 10 weeks ago to succeed Jacques Rogge. "We will have more targeted tests, based on profiles and intelligence we get from national anti-doping agencies, federations and NOCs."