OSAKA — First the good news: As of 4 p.m. Monday, there had been no positive doping tests at the 11th IAAF World Athletics Championships.

"We are realists," Dr. Gabriel Dolle, the IAAF's medical and anti-doping director said. "Some athletes escape detection. We must continue our efforts."

But remember this: Expect there to be bad news before the conclusion of the Osaka meet.

Five hundred athletes had been tested by the end of Sunday's competition, according to the IAAF. Testing began on Aug. 20. Some athletes had taken both urine-sample tests and blood-sample tests. The breakdown: 363 blood samples and 195 urine samples.

The IAAF plans to conduct 1,000 tests before the end of the World Championships.

On Monday afternoon, the IAAF organized a press conference to discuss its anti-doping efforts.

This interview session with reporters consisted of a five-man panel: Dolle; Dr. Juan Manuel Alonso, chairman of the IAAF Medical Commission; Dr. Fumihiro Yamasawa, vice chairman of the Local Organizing Committee Medical and Anti-Doping Commission; former long jumper Mike Powell, the 1991 World Championships gold medal winner and world record-holder who now coaches at UCLA; and Chris Butler, the communications and education manager of the IAAF's Medical and Anti-Doping Commission.

Yamasawa said the IAAF's doping tests were an around-the-clock effort.

"Our job is a very big challenge," Yamasawa said.

For instance, the doping testing staff closed its office at 2 a.m. on Monday. Yamasawa didn't arrive at his hotel until 3:30 a.m.

In addition, the IAAF has used a comprehensive out-of-testing program this year, with more than 12,000 blood and urine samples collected. All these tests were targeted, Butler said.

This included extensive blood tests in Mombasa, Kenya, during this year's World Cross Country Championships, Yamasawa noted.

Powell spoke passionately about the importance of successful athletes being role models, recounting that his coach told him working hard was the key to success, i.e. doing things the right way.

"If people get caught, it means the system is working," he said.

Dolle described the IAAF's testing procedures in the interview room, explaining that the three finalists in each event are tested and that two or three others are tested randomly. In addition, testing after heats and qualifying rounds is done randomly.

He commended the IAAF for increasing its drug-testing efforts in recent years, but admitted it's not a perfect system.

"In any profession, whether it be business or athletics, if there is power or money to be gained there is going to be a certain percentage of people who are going to try to cheat and try to do it the wrong way," Powell said. "The main thing is that the IAAF is really clamping down on the possibility of somebody cheating."

The IAAF panel was asked if due to suspicion of doping from past decades — East Germany's record-breaking athletes were cited as examples — the organization would consider throwing out its old record book and beginning with a new record book.

"I would be totally against it for obvious reasons," said Powell, whose jump of 8.95 meters in 1991 in Tokyo still stands. "Probably there were some people doing things they shouldn't have done. But I don't think it would be right to penalize people who did it the right way."

Alonso said greater cooperation and collaborative work between government and sports organizations is needed to combat the increased influence of organized crime on doping.