By Les Tan/Red Sports
Michael Phelps training in Singapore last year just before the 2008 Beijing Olympics. (Photo © Richard Seow)
Michael Phelps, 23, caught on photograph apparently smoking marijuana, has lost Kellogg as a sponsor and was also suspended for three months by USA Swimming.
Phelps, who won eight gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, was featured on Frosted Flakes and Corn Flakes cereal boxes. The drug association was apparently too much for the U.S. food company to take.
Other sponsors – Speedo, Omega, Visa, Mazda and Subway – have not withdrawn their sponsorship of the swimmer.
The dangers of marijuana, known also as ganja, include distorted thinking, extreme depressions and paranoia.
All things considered, it could have been worse. If he was caught smoking marijuana in Singapore, he would be facing up to 10 years in jail or a S$20,000 fine, or both.
I think the media should give this guy a break.
Phelps has been training professionally since 15 and his punishing schedule has taken his teenage years away from him.
Now that he has become a living legend, he is taking some time off to do and try what most other Americans have done growing up. Morally, I see no wrong in this at all. We just need to be reminded at times that he is human after all.
Well.. it depends on his affiliation in Singapore.
It could all be just ‘an honest mistake’ which demands a small print in the mainsteam media, under another ‘fallen tree’ front page news.