Jordan Burroughs on Russia's Olympics Ban Due to State-Sponsored Doping

I want to talk to you about this. When you're talking about authenticity. I want to talk to you about... Have you ever seen the movie Icarus? I have dabbled. I'm honestly... I don't want to watch it entirely because I would be so angry afterwards. It's crazy. Because I've lost to Russians and some of the biggest matches of my career. And I know if I saw that I would be so pissed off because they have changed my life in terms of being an Olympic champion, winning more world titles, more golds. They've taken money out of my pocket, notoriety and fame away from me and it has... It'll really upset me. So that's why I've decided not to. It's a good thing to watch just to understand the sophistication involved. Just to be upset. Let me explain to people that don't know what we're talking about. Icarus is a documentary by Brian Fogel. And Brian was a cyclist. And what he did was he decided to do a race. And it was for the documentary. He did a race completely natural, recorded his results. And then he hired this Russian gentleman who was a part of the Russian supposedly their anti-doping association. Drop the anti. Well, he eventually as time went on, it got exposed. But he just completely lucked into this situation where he hired this guy to tell him, what should I do? His name was Grigory Ruchenko. Thank you, Jamie. He's a man, too. He is a man. And Grigory told him exactly what he should take and when he should take it and do this and do that. And this is how... And then he was going to do the same race again the following year, but juiced up and see what the difference in performance was. Along the way, the Sochi Olympics gets exposed and that the Russians had cheated. And what they had done was it was a super sophisticated scandal where they cut a hole in the wall and they were transferring the dirty piss through one hole and giving them the clean sample to replace. So they had found that there was microscopic scratches and these supposedly impossible to open bottles. So the Russians had figured out a way to open these bottles. To reopen those things. And it is... The real ones? Have you ever seen one of the real bottles? No, I haven't seen them in the flesh. You cannot open them. You will break them if you open them. Impossible. They have this sophisticated system in there where it's locked into the interlocks with the glass. So once you close it as tightly as possible, you cannot reopen it. Well, they somehow or another figure to work around to get in there and open it. And when they did that, they achieved an unprecedented number of gold medals. I mean, they just... They dominated the Sochi Olympics in Russia. I'm pissed, bro. I'm hot because I'm hot. And we know it. We know it. Pull up... I don't even want to get into this. Please get into it. So pull up... I lost in the quarterfinals of the Olympic Games in 2016. There's a guy named Anwar Gudoyev. I just want you to see a picture of this guy. You tell me. Was this in Rio? If he's clean, this was in Rio. And Rio weren't a lot of the Russians. They were kicked out of Rio because of Sochi. So they did the most Russian... The most failed test by Russia in all Olympic sports. First was track and field. Second was weightlifting. Third was wrestling. Wrestling was number three out of all Olympic sports. However many programs there are, I'm sure there are a ton of sports. You've talked about it. Wrestling was third. They pro-date all these samples. So they're getting popping guys from 08, 2012. And they're saying, you know what? This guy was on a substance. He was on some sort of performance enhancing drug. So we're going to strip him of his medal. We're going to give the guy that took fifth place the bronze medal instead. But at that point, it's such a different experience. You never got to stand on the podium. You never got to travel the world and tell everyone about your medal. You never got to get that check that was associated with whatever success that you had. And also someone taking away someone's gold medal and then giving it to you is not the same. It's not the same. So it's life changing experience that you miss out on because these guys are being unhealthy. And just straight up cheater. So like, I like, there's a certain amount of disdain that I have for Russia. I respect them because they're tremendous wrestlers. Not everyone cheats. Not everyone cheats. But there are those who do. And it's well known in the wrestling community. And so at this point, we have had to just accept it and try to beat them. You just like, you just got to beat them because it doesn't matter. They are so powerful. The IOC is so powerful that regardless of what they do, Thomas Bach and the IOC will never make a stance in which they will completely ban Russia. So they've banned Russia from the Olympic Games, but the athletes that test cleanly can still compete under a different flag. So ultimately it'd be like the independent Republic of Russia that they can still compete in, but the Russian flag will not be visible in Tokyo or in Paris in 2024. You cannot compete under the Russian national flag. Really? Done. Wow. I didn't know that. Done. So it's, they've been banned from the Olympic games, their governing body, Russia itself. So all Russian athletes will have to go through a testing process and then they will be able to compete on as independent athletes under a different flag, but not the Russian flag. And that's how far we've come, bro. And like, I've seen so many athletes in track and field and weightlifting and wrestling that have seen other athletes get stripped and then have been given their medals years later and all they get is an Instagram post. It's not. Bro, like you didn't get a chance to win. It's not cool. It's not the same. And it's, it's sad because it, it, it, it's the butterfly effect, right? Because it messes up the, the, the ripple of the entire bracket, right? So it's like, you beat this guy and then all he loses here and this guy goes here and this guy retires or he changes weight classes. Like there's just so many things that just happened because of this. So it doesn't make me happy. It doesn't sit well with me, but at this point, like, what do you do? Like, I mean, you blow the whistle enough times, but you just got to do what you can to, to avoid it. And that the only way to do it is beat them. I think in wrestling, we have kind of like the biggest margin of error because just because someone's in great shape doesn't mean you can't beat them in wrestling. There's so much precision and technical skill that's associated with it that you can still overcome that steep hill. But that's a problem with the Russians as well, because they're very proficient. They're freaking very good. They're freaking good. And the wrestlers in these, you know, provinces and caucuses are insane, insane at the sport. Like they, from birth, they are competing and training at the highest level. It's unlike, like here you got the youth sports and you play games and you know what I mean? You play freeze tag with your buddies at practice and you do a couple of rope climbs, you're done. Like these guys are training like Olympians at eight years old. They're doing brack bridge kickovers and they're learning five point throws and they're just technically savvy at a much earlier age because they're bred for this. We think we have it hard here. Like poverty here is nothing like poverty in other countries, especially, you know, and like of setia or Chechnya and all these places. Like it's just a different vibe there. So they have some amazing wrestlers and amazing motivation to that poverty. Oh, it's life changing. They're tied into the government. The US is the only country that their Olympic team is not government funded. The only country in the world where our Olympic team is funded privately by donations, corporate sponsors. That's it. We're only country in the entire world. Every, every country in the world has the government funding the way that they operate and making sure that they are competing at a high level. That's got to be an incredible disgrace for Russia to be eliminated from the 2020 and 2024 Olympics. Yeah. Well, when you stand on top of the podium, bro, there's a certain amount of pride that comes with seeing your flag raised above all else. That is a special moment. And so for them, I don't know because is it pride or is it, is it financial incentive? Is it just being an Olympic champion? Let me ask you this. The guy wins in 2008. Okay. And, and, and pops like they retroactively test the samples and then he, is he still capable of competing in the future or is he eliminated forever? Well, it depends. I mean, if, if you pop from a few years ago, then maybe, I don't know, maybe they pro date your suspension and say, okay, every, let's say if you got suspended on that day for two years post that day, all of your results in that period of time will probably be eliminated. But I don't think they would say that. I've heard that argument, but I've also heard the argument that if you're cheating, you should be eliminated for life, for life. And that that's the only way to stop cheaters is that like, if you want to stop someone from doing something, it's prestigious as the Olympic gold medal. That's a death sentence. I don't know. I know it's death sentence, but I mean, you, you are, you're cheating. Yeah. You're cheating. It's a thing like the whole reason to win the Olympics is for glory and for the opportunity for sponsorships for Americans and that's why other countries are doing it. Yeah. Like, well, it's political growth glory and when Russia had it in the Sochi Olympics, that was, it's not like coincidence. They're following that medal count closely, bro. Don't let anybody fool you. That medal count every year at every Olympic games is something that us in the village as athletes and the presidents of each particular respective country, they're following that. They want to win. They want to be the best. Of course. That's, that's big to them. So above all else, some people are willing to take some crazy chances to be successful because they know the incentives that will follow them getting their hand raised. But you know, some people operate with character and they're like, you know what, win or lose. I'm not doing these things. I think though with Russia, and this was pretty clear because of this. They don't have a choice. They don't have a choice. Yeah, they don't have a choice. So, you know, I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I think you're right. I'm going to be honest. I'm a little suspicious. I probably get a lot of heat for it. And Russians probably won't be happy with it. But even if he didn't test positive then the odds of him using steroids up before then or using some sort of performing, whether it's EPO for training to get to where he got to like physically, you know, you keep a lot of the gains no matter what. That's the hard part about it is within that space, if you don't have a choice, fine. Right. You know, Joe, listen, if you want to be on a podcast, you have to do this. The government tells you, hey, you want to compete for the Russian team. You have to take or you can go be a construction worker for the rest of your life and make a minimum wage. You're like, I'll take that podcast. Give me that. Right. So I think it's a very different vibe there. Like they don't have opportunity outside. Like they can't go to university. They don't go to school. Russian wrestlers don't go to college. They don't go to universities and get four year degrees and get masters and go on to the corporate world. They don't do that. It's either you are an Olympic champion or they will choose a job for you. And it's probably not one that's super enticing or you will work in some sort of organized, you know, syndicate. Yeah, it's just different. Catch new episodes of the Joe Rogan experience for free only on Spotify. Watch back catalog JRE videos on Spotify, including clips, easily, seamlessly switch between video and audio experience on Spotify. You can listen to the JRE in the background while using other apps and can download episodes to save on data costs all for free. Spotify is absolutely free. You don't have to have a premium account to watch new JRE episodes. You just need to search for the JRE on your Spotify app. Go to Spotify now to get this full episode of the Joe Rogan experience.