'Disgraced' sprinter Ben Johnson claims doping widespread on track

25 years after Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson was stripped of his 1988 gold medal at the Seoul Olympics, the athlete has joined a fight against doping and said that just because an athlete tested positive did not mean he was clean.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, a few weeks short of the anniversary of the 'dirtiest race in history', Johnson sat inside a Midtown Manhattan hotel's windowless conference room to present himself as a cautionary tale, a living lesson on the perils of doping, and a truth-teller in a world where, he said, cover-ups were as common as cheats.

He said he decided to speak out because he wanted to help make changes in today's society about drugs in sports.

Johnson said that he was a small part of the bigger problem and was setting the record straight.

The athlete said that his coach told him that everybody at his level was doing it, and so he had to join in to be on a level playing field.

Johnson was speaking to an audience of fewer than two-dozen people, and the event was organised by SKINS, a Swiss compression clothing company, which is promoting an online petition to reduce doping in sports, the report said.

Johnson will visit Australia next week as part of SKINS, the report added.