USA Swimming suspends Michael Phelps, may not swim in 2012 Games

Michael Phelps was suspended from competition for three months by USA Swimming, the latest fallout from a photo that showed the Olympic great inhaling from a marijuana pipe.

The sport’s national governing body also cut off its financial support to Phelps for the same three-month period, effective Thursday.

“This is not a situation where any anti-doping rule was violated, but we decided to send a strong message to Michael because he disappointed so many people, particularly the hundreds of thousands of USA Swimming member kids who look up to him as a role model and a hero,” the Colorado-based federation said in a statement.

“Michael has voluntarily accepted this reprimand and has committed to earn back our trust.”


http://sports.yahoo.com/top/news?slug=ap-phelpssuspended&prov=ap&type=lgns

Michael Phelps is not sure if he will participate in the Olympics again.

In the wake of the tabloid photograph showing the American swimming great smoking from a marijuana pipe, Phelps told The Baltimore Sun on Wednesday that the intense public scrutiny has him contemplating whether to compete in the 2012 Games in London.

In his first public comments since the story broke, the 23-year-old Phelps spoke with the newspaper inside Baltimore’s Meadowbrook Aquatic Center after finishing his daily workout.

“This is a decision of mine that I’m not going to make today and I’m not going to make tomorrow,” said Phelps, who won a record eight gold medals last summer at the Beijing Olympics. “It’s going to require a lot of time and energy and a lot of thinking for myself - but also talking to (my coach Bob Bowman) and talking to my family and just deciding what I want to do.”

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/news?slug=txmichaelphelpsmarijuana&prov=st&type=lgns

Give me a break.

...I'll bet the Netherlands would be happy to have him on their team! (do they have a swimming team?)

:hippie:

Jeebus H. Christ on a trailer hitch.

:grr:

did he ever test positive for anything?

was there anything in the bong?

bullshit

Few to none of the kids in my school would be "disappointed" in Phelps as a role model for this.

and why should it disappoint ANYONE except the prohibitionists who want people to believe that it's an 'evil narcotic', when it's neither.

Bullshit

HE IS BREATHING IN WATER!!!

He IS a fish

:silly:

anyone who has seen "Water World" knows that that is where the gills are-behind the ears

just imagine how much smoke he sucked in there!

hhhwwwfFFFtttpt GONE

Dude, :wtf: :shrug:


as my friends who did that sort of thing back in the day tell me

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we come down hard on him, while bush and cheney are walking around after taking this country in the gutter.

He had to have tested "clean" while competing. Who cares what he does on his down time ffs.

Maybe for riflery.

Or competition eating.

it's so petty and stupid and pretty damn obvious. Even that dumbass sheriff in Florida(?) that said he would charge him for doing illegal drugs...yea pot, I know.

So the bottom line is now that the greatest swimmer in the world's reputation has been shredded into dust.

Will they try to take away his medals because he smoked some weed?! :mad:

I thought the athletes were screened for any and all drugs before competing, performance enhancing or not?

Weed ain't in their list of banned substance.

And as a direct result of their actions, weed sales goes skyrocketing!

*puff* *puff* *pass*

I hate these self-righteous ASSHOLES! :grr: :puke:

I'm sure those same self-righteous idiots, pop pills or consume lots of alcohol nightly.

The kid won nine gold medals. He's obviously a fine physical specimen, an incredible athlete, and just 23 years old.

All because he got photographed taking a rip off a bong by some asshole who's gonna get PAID for selling the pic to a tabloid.

Lie a nation into war, steal the entire treasury, allow the biggest attack on American soil in history, you get to move into an exclusive neighborhood.

Smoke dope? Expect the worst.

What a country.

This kid does something a lot of kids his age do, and he loses millions and gets suspended. What a country indeed.

Let him lead a normal life like the rest of us for once. Christ.

We should just elect winners at purity balls and give them gold medals for being so scrumdilee-iciously preciously "pure" of mind and body. :eyes:

:eyes:

Never touched it myself, but even I can see just how idiotic the whole charade is.

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we'll do it for you.

A successful pot smoker is the most terrifying person there is to the powers that be.

thinks marijuana is evil are all fucking idiots. That is all."