The full USADA report on Alberto Salazar has been leaked - Here it is

Running doc 122 wrote:

The issue is units. There are about 10grams per 50mls in a vial of L-c. The blood value is measured in molar concentration expressed as micromol per liter. So you could possibly go from 50 to 2000+ if given just under 45mls if given L-c via IV infusion.

The violation occurs with the additional saline fluid bolus (the remaining 'drip' in the 100ml bags) which exceeds the 50ml limit.

1st bold question: 50-2000+ of what?grams?, ml? L?

2nd bold question: if they had just under 45ml per 10gram of L-c mixed in 100 ml bags of saline (which is how an IV bolus can be given), then why squeeze the bag to go faster? 100ml bag can go pretty darn quick if you had it wide open, no?

Help me understand wrote:

Running doc 122 wrote:

The issue is units. There are about 10grams per 50mls in a vial of L-c. The blood value is measured in molar concentration expressed as micromol per liter. So you could possibly go from 50 to 2000+ if given just under 45mls if given L-c via IV infusion.

The violation occurs with the additional saline fluid bolus (the remaining 'drip' in the 100ml bags) which exceeds the 50ml limit.

1st bold question: 50-2000+ of what?grams?, ml? L?

?

It's right there. Blood value is measured in molar concentration expressed in micromol per liter.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

jewbacca wrote:

Further, USADA has concluded that in so doing Dr. Brown engaged in serial violations of professional, medical and ethical obligations to his patients, putting them at increased risk of injury to their health and wellbeing and in jeopardy of losing their athletic eligibility.

I wonder how USADA thinks making decisions about professional, medical, and ethical obligations of medical practitioners is within its scope?

They aren't really. They will leave that to a judge and jury.

rojo wrote:

spinoza wrote:

USADA cannot keep confidential documents they have been trusted with confidential. Their rank incompetence casts extreme doubt on any findings or opinions they have. No credibility. No expertise. Probably corrupt. No reasonable athlete would cooperate with the USADA in any way, shape, or form.

So by your logic, I hope you voted for Trump and never vote Democratic because Fancy Bears also hacked the DNC. Donald Trump is the president of the US because these guys are such good hackers.

Holy crap... not even close to the same.

Is this summary right? wrote:

If any athlete felt uncomfortable, they could politely say 'no.' They are not children.

So if a major leaguer feels a very adult twinge of remorse after using a banned substance because he knows it isn't fair, he's not guilty of a doping violation?

If he doesn't have a dismissive, "Piss on everyone, I want my 45 home runs" attitude, and instead caves mostly to pressure from his teammates about the reality of hGH as a career enhancer, he's not guilty of a doping violation?

They're not chiefly interested in Ritz or athletes who have plausible deniability with regard to the infusion volumes. They are interested in Brown and Salazar, who have absolutely no plausible deniability.

All of the concerns about medical-record privacy people keep tossing into the discussion are irrelevant to the topic. "I sure as hell wouldn't give *my* records to an incompetent bunch like USADA!" you say. Well, then don't. Also don't offer them next week's winning lottery numbers from the fortune cookie you get last night at the China Garden. They don't care about you.

rojo may not always articulate his thoughts with utmost consideration and clarity, but he is right on point here. He's looking at what the report might signify for the NOP. Not at what it might not for a host of whimsical and red-herring-driven reasons.

LetsRun.com wrote:

We've read the 269 page report and have summarized 6 key takeaways from it.

They are as follows.

1) USADA presents strong evidence that all of the Nike Oregon Project runners that received L-carnitine injections from Dr. Brown – Dathan Ritzenhein, Galen Rupp, Tara Edrmann (now Welling), Lindsay Allen, Alvina Begay, and Dawn Grunnagle – committed anti-doping violations

2) Alberto Salazar misled athletes about his interactions with USADA (and the treatment they were receiving)

If any of these athletes are sanctioned by WADA for doping violations I wonder if they have a legal case against Salazar, Dr Brown, and Nike for misleading them on the treatments.

A Dr lying to a patient about a medical treatment HAS to be a major violation. How can any athlete trust Salazar after this?

soggyrolls wrote:

Why are more people not realizing that Magness was the one figuring out whether or not things were above ground and the gains they could make? Magness is just as big of a crook as Alberto is. He may be more since he willingly self injected himself with this stuff.

Absolutely this.

Where are you coming up with the spirit of the law thing? Alberto emailed USADA asking if he could violate the rule. They said no. The report presents strong evidence that he went and did it anyway.

When Alberto emailed USADA and said "hey we just want to inject l-carnitine" they didn't write back, "oh yeah are rules are wrong, the spirit of them is not to ban injections of legal substances but just to stop masking of doping. They wrote back and said essentially follow the rule."

As I read the report, I flagged multiple instances where Alberto professed to wanting to follow the rules, but by the time I got to the end of the report, it was clear to me they broke them.

I agree with this assessment in regards to L-Carnitine. Do we think they still are using l-carnitine?

However, if you think he was doing something with the androgel you can't really believe that.

'

Fill me in on Rupp's suspicious test result? That's not ringing a bell in my memory.

The report could have been leaked but reports are that it was not leaked but rather HACKED by the Russian outfit Fancy Bears. There is a difference there but you could think the hacking claim is a smokescreen to leak it.

wejo wrote:

2) NOP are finally cheaters because they broke the 50mL rule. However, they clearly didn't violate the spirit of the law here. That rule is solely to prevent dilutive transfusions to cover up PEDs. NOP infused >50mLs just to up some random metabolite levels and banned PEDs never came into play.

Where are you coming up with the spirit of the law thing?

[/quote]

I agree with Harambe and had a similar thought yesterday.

Rojo, you've been anti-Salazar for years because you feel his methods violate the spirit of the law. A true competitor doesn't resort to Testoboost, thyroid TUEs, etc to get an advantage even though it's legal, right?

Now you want to nail him for violating the letter of the law when he's not in violation of the spirit of that very law. That's hypocritical. You know very well that the 50 mL limit is to prevent masking during drug tests.

Let's frame the violation in another light. If I go run 20 miles in the heat and then give myself a saline drip to rehydrate, technically I've broken doping regulations. But would you really consider me a doper?

The only difference in the NOP's case they are injecting a legal substance. To me it's ridiculous to call that doping.

Yeesh that quote didn't come out right. And I'm responding to both rojo and wejo here.

wejo wrote:

casual obsever wrote:

If USADA will be able to prove testo doping (see this report, see NY Times, and see Rupp's suspicious test results in early 2016 etc.), then the fans here will claim that others do the same, so NOP is fine.

'

Fill me in on Rupp's suspicious test result? That's not ringing a bell in my memory.

Wejo- the suspicious test result was reported in the Der Spiegel article about NOP from March. Center also had a suspicious result as well.

jewbacca wrote:

wejo wrote:

2) NOP are finally cheaters because they broke the 50mL rule. However, they clearly didn't violate the spirit of the law here. That rule is solely to prevent dilutive transfusions to cover up PEDs. NOP infused >50mLs just to up some random metabolite levels and banned PEDs never came into play.

Where are you coming up with the spirit of the law thing?

I agree with Harambe and had a similar thought yesterday.

Rojo, you've been anti-Salazar for years because you feel his methods violate the spirit of the law. A true competitor doesn't resort to Testoboost, thyroid TUEs, etc to get an advantage even though it's legal, right?

Now you want to nail him for violating the letter of the law when he's not in violation of the spirit of that very law. That's hypocritical. You know very well that the 50 mL limit is to prevent masking during drug tests.

Let's frame the violation in another light. If I go run 20 miles in the heat and then give myself a saline drip to rehydrate, technically I've broken doping regulations. But would you really consider me a doper?

The only difference in the NOP's case they are injecting a legal substance. To me it's ridiculous to call that doping.[/quote]

I would consider you a cheater/doper/unethical/ at best maybe just a naive idiot, yes. But this is so far beyond an simple saline IV (if you applied for a tue you'd be fine). Alberto is a chemist not a coach. You think this stops at L-carnitine? You think he isn't getting compound testosterone from his supplier Brown?

This is like tax evasion on Al Capone. This is what they may be able to prove to get him. But there is a whole lot more going on here. The carnitine infusions give 7-9% for a short time, that's equal to blood doping with epo. You wonder how he ran so fast indoors in 2014? You wonder what happened to Rowbury when she started running all weirdly in that indoor race? Mo Farah collapsing/passing out? Are you really that naive? You think he isn't microdosing compound testosterone with rupp and centro? He probably has them on some undetectable peptides and other "cutting edge" drugs. FOH

50-2000 micromole/L

Based on some quick calculations using the molecular weight of L-c, each 50ml vials would contain about 1,242,236 micromol/L. This is drastically changed once entered the body and metabolized and is unique per individual.

All I'm trying to point out is we cannot argue about going from 50 to 2000 of something by giving 50 of another think without thinking in terms of the units. Its pretty basic really and regardless the point is they doped.

wejo wrote:

Where are you coming up with the spirit of the law thing? Alberto emailed USADA asking if he could violate the rule. They said no. The report presents strong evidence that he went and did it anyway.

Let's just be clear that an administrator saying "no" does not in and of itself make something illegal. They can help you to interpret the regulation, but their word is not law.

As a developer, I have been told "no" by codes agencies and zoning officers only to look into the law myself, determine that their advice was incorrect, and proceed as planned despite their objections.

I'm not picking a side on this particular issue, as I don't know the underlying law, but the mere fact that they were told "no" doesn't mean anything if that answer from USADA was not grounded in law.

I am not following your post. I will recap thoughts / questions. 1. Are these serious violations? USADA has not taken any action or issued a report. This is a draft report prepared for a hearing.2. How unusual is this? I would like to see a USADA report with some context. Other athletes take asthma meds, thyroid meds, vitamin D, etc., which are not banned. How different is what Brown / Salazar doing from what Brown does with other athletes (the L-Carnitine seems to be the biggest difference)? Did Brown provide similar treatment to other athletes? Do other doctors provide athletes with similar treatments?3. If athletes think Dr. Brown committed medical malpractice, they should report that. 4. If athletes wanted treatment that they thought it was within the rules but was not, then they had bad luck. That is especially true if USADA takes action and declares a serious violation. For example, Tyson Gay says he trusted people and took stuff. (You can believe him or not.) Lauryn Williams, in another context, said she was offered things and did not accept. Tyson Gay was responsible and suspended. 5. To your point (or what I think is your point), its natural that people feel remorse if they did something wrong. I am questioning athletes who say they were forced into something that they did not want to do. These are pro athletes who are well compensated. If they did not want to take asthma meds, cytomel, or the IV - then simply don't do it. Don't say 'I did not want to but I had to.'

Rojo,

As I understand it, your position on this thread is that any violation of the text of a rule is a violation of the rule, and should be punished. You don't seem to have a lot of time for people who want to invoke other considerations, such as spirit or purpose, when applying the rule.

In the jargon of the law, you are a textualist.

Yet two years ago, when Emma Coburn stepped off the track at Nationals, you argued the opposite. You claimed Coburn clearly violated the text of the rule. You also said she got an advantage from ignoring the words. But you then said, "I'm glad Coburn wasn't DQd. To me, it's common sense...."

In other words, in addition to the words of the text, the rules include "common sense."

In the jargon of the law, you are a purposivist, or pragmatist, who believes we need to look beyond the text to figure out what a rule says.

I'm not saying that you were right or wrong to take either of these approaches. Both are accepted ways reading rules, and have been forever. I am simply curious as to why you took one approach in the case of Coburn and the opposite approach here. Why was it ok for Coburn violate the text of the rule, but not Salazar?

A Loyal Reader

PS The different approaches offer different benefits, and impose different costs. Judge Posner explains these differences nicely in his dissent in Marshall, "Textualism buys political neutrality and a type of objectivity at the price of substantive injustice, while pragmatism buys justice in the individual case at the price of considerable uncertainty and, not infrequently, judicial willfulness."

I would add that I think Ken Goe is right. The biggest issue / question is testosterone.

It usually annoys me when someone quotes a long post in its entirety, but this is one of the most thoughtful, informative, and well-written posts I've ever seen on LRC. The clear explanation of textualisn versus pragmatism is something I'm sure I will draw on in the future. Thank you for a great post. Now back to morans and doping.

The WADA rulebook does not have a category of "serious violations." Infusions of more than 50ml in 6 hrs. is a violation and would be subject to a sanction. This report was prepared in response to a subpoena from the Texas Medical Board for them to conduct some inquiry on Dr. Brown. I suspect USADA has not taken any action because they are still hoping for more access to Dr. Brown's records, and possibly additional violation on the part of non-cooperating athletes.

I don't know how unusual it is or how many other athletes were doing it. Adam Goucher was seeing Dr. Brown at the behest of Mark Wetmore before starting with Alberto. Ryan Hall was seeing him. So clearly it wasn't limited to Salazar. The infusion does seem to be something I've only heard about with his athletes (and it seems based on a research study and an "emerging supplement" which he wants to get an edge with before it comes to market. All the thyroid, asthma, Vitamin D stuff is a nonstarter for USADA, only the infusions of greater than 50ml and the potential testosterone use (which is implied but has much, much weaker supporting evidence) are important for USADA purposes. All the rest is just an attempt at leverage against Dr. Brown.

Yes, they should. Maybe they did. From the surface appearance it is USADA that seems to be the complaining party. They are using every bit of leverage they can.

They are adults. If they didn't want to take something they shouldn't. I think it is possible that USADA hasn't acted because they don't want to suspend any of the cooperating witnesses unless they can get the noncooperating parties on other violations. Just speculation on my part. But I do think they are all going to get suspended if anybody does.