Former WADA President receives Laureus award

Former WADA President Richard W. Pound received this week the 2008 "Spirit of Sport" award from the Laureus World Sports Academy in a ceremony held in Saint-Petersburg, Russia. The Laureus awards recognize every year significant achievments in sports.

"The Spirit of Sport Award recognizes the struggle of one man who over 20 years has been a crusader against doping in sport," said former US track star Edwin Moses, chairman of the Laureus World Sports Academy. "Always outspoken, often vilified within sport and the media, he has remained steadfast in his convictions that doping equals cheating and is systematically destroying sport from within. Given the last sporting year's revelations he has been proven right." "Last year he stepped down after eight years as president of the World Anti-Doping Agency, but his dedication to raising this issue to the top of the sporting and governmental agenda is exemplary."

Mr Pound, still a member of WADA's Foundation Board, said: "Winning this award is fabulous both for me and for the recognition that the Laureus World Sports Academy has thus given to the fight against drugs in sport. I am delighted and honoured to be recognized by a body of such sporting legends, and it is a wonderful end to my eight years as chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency."