Bermudasport anti-dopingauthority

Bermuda Council for Drug-Free Sport Press ConferenceArticle added on 03/05/2011

For those of you who do not know me, I am Jon Beard, Chairman of the Bermuda Council for Drug-free Sport. We have invited you here to today to announce a few things which we are very excited about.

The Bermuda Council for Drug-free Sport has been undergoing a strategic change in its delivery of services driven by the issue of the WADA 2009 Code. There have been a number of fundamental changes that have affected our operations and we have been diligently working in several areas in order to achieve Compliance for the island of Bermuda and be identified as a best practice agency in the delivery of services.

One of the most important strategic changes identified is the need for legislation with the Government diligently working towards this.  Within the frame work of Legislation it was deemed necessary to change our name in order to bring the agency in line with its added areas of responsibility. As such, we are pleased to announce today that with immediate effect we will now be known as the Bermuda Sport Anti Doping Authority. Similar in stature to the Bermuda Monetary Authority with their responsibility to the country over banks and investments firms, we will have the primary authority over athletes and sporting bodies as it relates to strict liability and application of the Code and the Bermuda Sport Anti Doping Authority Rules and our Domestic Rules for Illicit Testing.

We have been working with Fusion of the DNA Group who have developed our branding and we are please to unveil our new logo. This logo was created with the belief that most athletes like to consider themselves as stars, whether they are international or domestic athletes. The BSADA logo has an icon which represents a star. This particular design has a number of meanings. The star is made up with solid coloured check marks along with a solid coloured circle at the bottom corner of each check mark. The check mark represents the all clear for an athlete or that everything checks out for them to carry on without incident.

The solid circle along with the check mark together symbolizes a stylized representation of a person. This along with the overlapping of each check mark refers to our community. This represents the community working together for a common goal. This common goal would see the success of the athlete. Colours used in the star icon represent the green lush landscape of our island home. Green also symbolizes prosperity which we hope will transfer into a large number of athletes with a large number of achievements in their sporting career.

With the advent of the 2009 Code, it has also been necessary to increase staffing levels in order to achieve best practice and delivery quality programmes and services. We are pleased to announce that Cathy Belvedere will continue to head the agency in the role as Executive Director. Cathy’s team is Granville Bennett as Education Officer, Carlnika Roser (pronounced Rosa) as Doping Control Manager, Duncan Barclays as Results, Compliance and Investigations Manager and Deborah Lambert as Business and Administration Officer.

The Board is very satisfied in knowing that with our name and the staff now firmly in place, we are well positioned to be the Authority for Anti Doping in Bermuda.  Whether domestic or amateur sports, national or international level, athletes, athlete support personnel or indeed professional level athletes, we all have a role to play in creating a level playing field for our athletes. The Bermuda Sport Anti Doping authority is here to serve the Bermuda community in this regard and we firmly believe that The Bermudian sporting community can deter athletes from using banned doping practices and illicit substances through the provision of high quality independent and accessible anti-doping programmes together with a comprehensive education and awareness plan in order to enhance the value of sport and promote a healthy environment in which to compete, and for the community to enjoy.

We thank you for coming today and we are looking forward to working with you and indeed inviting you back in the very near future to unveil our new website as well as a number of other events that we will be introducing this year.