Swimmer Nick O'Hare (right), Ireland's outstanding sprinter, spoke out on television recently about being offered performance-enhancing drugs when he was training in Hamburg - an offer he declined. No great surprise there.

Imagine our surprise then when a letter arrived from another outstanding Irish swimmer, Earl McCarthy, claiming that Hamburg is one of the cleanest places on earth - banned substance wise that is.

O'Hare was not specific about who offered him this "competitive edge", but what is it about Hamburg that has brought about such division in the normally, er, completely divided world of Irish swimming?