2008 Beijing Olympics

right, i was a bit combative last night, and i apologise to anyone i offended. but i still reckon hoy's performances raise suspicion. maybe he really is that good, but watching other "clean" heroes like marion jones, tim montgomery and justin gatlin fall from grace has made me a cynic.

i also realise the impossibility of proving someone is not a cheat.

Fair enough. The point I was trying to make is simply that the level of scrutiny over doping is probably higher now than it ever has been, and that Hoy, because of having broken so many records, has probably been singled out for particularly close attention.

Plus I think there would be a certain amount of peer pressure within Team GB to be clean because of the level of scrutiny there will inevitably be on their success.

As for the full-time amateur thing - erm, you're making the mistake of confusing your own classification for the formal classification. Team GB trained full-time, and were given 25k pa stipends. I'm not sure any other country basically gave their athletes enough money that they wouldn't have to work. But they're still classed as amateur for the Games.

As I said elsewhere, there have already been dark mutterings about the level of GB funding, and it wouldn't surprise me if there's a debate over what counts as amateur/professional between now and 2012.