updated 8:07 p.m. ET April 15, 2008

CHICAGO - The U.S. Olympic Committee leadership downplays its medal hopes any chance it gets and considers Chicago a long shot to land the 2016 Games. When it comes to the subject of sending a drug-free team to Beijing, though, the USOC is much more positive.

“This will be a clean team,” chairman Peter Ueberroth said Tuesday at the USOC media summit.

During a wide-ranging news conference that included no sense of alarm at political issues brewing around China, Ueberroth and CEO Jim Scherr stopped just short of guaranteeing there would be no positive drug tests among the 600 U.S. athletes who will compete in August in China.

But they were optimistic. They touted the advances that have been made in the fight against dopers since the last Olympics — including more effective testing policies by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency — and suggested those athletes who cheated in previous games were from a bygone era.

“I think we’ve gone to a new era in our country, and this will be a clean team,” Scherr said.

They were nowhere near as optimistic on Chicago’s standing in the race for the 2016 Olympics — “still not anywhere near first,” Ueberroth said — nor about the U.S. team’s chance to win the medal count as it has for the last three Summer Olympics. The United States will face stiff competition in the medals count with Russia and China, which has been targeting specific sports since 2002 as part of its “Project 119” — as in, 119 medals.

The Americans won the medal count in Athens with 102.

“You start doing the math, and that’s what keeps me up at night,” chief of sport performance Steve Roush said.

At world championships in 2006, China did very well, in some cases at the United States’ expense. Then last year, things shifted: The United States won four of six gold medals in women’s gymnastics (a record), 20 in swimming (best in 29 years) and 14 more in track (nine more than second-place Kenya).

“We have a good team. We have a strong team that will go on the field of play,” Scherr said. “But we’re making no illusions about the fact we think the Chinese have the strongest team heading into these games.”

There was nothing real new here — the USOC has said that for months — nor did Ueberroth introduce any new angles in the federation’s stance toward China.

The USOC is focusing on preparing athletes for the games, encouraging them to speak their mind on political issues when comfortable, but not demanding they do so or that they be silent.

Ueberroth says the move toward a more open society that many believed would spring forth when the International Olympic Committee awarded the Olympics to China is happening. That hasn’t been highlighted of late, though, because of nonstop news about pollution, Tibet, Darfur, human rights protests and disruptions along the torch relay route.

“Having gone there every year for last seven years, the country’s changed, and it’s opening up every single minute,” Ueberroth said. “Anyone who argues that is semi-blind. It is changing. Some could argue whether it’s changing fast enough.”

Ueberroth said he felt no need, during a visit to Beijing last week, to reiterate America’s intention to participate in the Olympics despite growing calls for a boycott.

He said he was still under the impression that President Bush will attend the games, but that if he didn’t, “it’s not going to dramatically affect our athletes at all.”

Ueberroth seemed so confident social issues won’t mar the games or steal attention from the athletes that he even had a suggestion for anyone considering a boycott of the opening ceremony, a position being more widely considered around the world over the last few months.

“I just hope anyone who doesn’t go to the Olympic Games opening ceremonies has the good judgment to give their tickets to families of competing athletes from whatever country they come from,” Ueberroth said.

The anti-doping effort dominated the second half of the news conference, and the USOC sounded an unusually optimistic tone. But when asked exactly what new measures were being put in place to spark the optimism, the leaders offered few specifics.

“We think we’ve got an unusual group of athletes who’ve seen people who have suffered from cheating,” Ueberroth said. “There are a lot of factors that make us comfortable. ... We want to build the reputation of bringing clean teams. The exact steps we’re taking is not something we’re going to talk about.”

Inside the Rings: The USOC recognized women’s water polo coach Guy Baker, who won national coach of the year earlier this month. Other coaching awards went to swimming’s Paul Yetter (developmental coach of the year), taekwondo’s Sherman Nelson (volunteer coach of the year), and track’s Adam Bleakney (paralympic coach of the year).

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