What the Salazar/NOP doping scandal really boils down to

ThisIsFutile wrote:

Just curious, and please point me to a better thread if there is one...

Regarding the original Epstein article, can someone help me understand the situation regarding the following section"

[quote]To use some asthma drugs legally, World Anti-Doping Agency rules require athletes to have a documented condition and obtain a waiver. Thyroid hormone is now prescribed so rampantly among world-ranking endurance runners that both athletes and some anti-doping officials—including UK Anti-Doping—are pushing for restrictions on its use. It's unclear whether the hormone, which counters the weight gain that can come with a thyroid condition, delivers a performance-enhancing effect for athletes who don't need it. Still, body builders have long abused thyroid hormone right before competitions in an effort to cut fat rapidly and enhance their ripped look.

My question is regarding Thyroid...if Kara's account is true, and AS gave her (as in physically handing her) prescription thyroid medication that she did not have a prescription for, is he breaking a rule? Can anyone point me to the official text in the USADA literature describing the violation?

Just want to stress that I'm not looking to debate whether or not its ethical which is a seperate and very valid issue, but if it breaks the letter of any specific rule.

Thanks in advance![/quote

Handing out prescription drugs to another person that doesn't have a prescription for that specific drug is against the law. No USADA needed.

A neutral outsider would say that as a major coach of runners Salazar necessarily had an acute interest in the hormone levels of his charges, which within legal bounds could aid their performance and at illegal levels could get them banned from the sport.

What could be more important for a coach to understand in an era when the athletes have to be constantly tested, and may be capriciously banned and pilloried for all kinds of innocent or ignorant missteps, such as Extenz or mis-packaged "supplements' or various commonly prescribed medicines such as prednizone?

Being professionally interested in drugs and hormones and wanting to understand their effects is different from abusing them. At worst, the evidence against Salazar shows that his interest in the subject touched on the morbid.

But expertise in these domains is unfortunately imperative in order to coach running professionals during the period of the drug wars, which sadly continue despite the development of the biometric passport, which should have put them to rest.

as an aside - from the SI article linked to above - love this quote from doper Dennis Mitchell:

Late last Thursday night Dennis Mitchell found the article he

had been looking for on the Internet, the story on Mary Slaney's

suspicious drug test at last June's U.S. Olympic track and

field trials. A three-time Olympian and last year the top-ranked

American at 100 meters, Mitchell, who is also chairman of the

USA Track & Field Athletes Advisory committee, carefully

absorbed every syllable of the story and, without judging

Slaney, instantly distilled its effect. "Another hit for our

sport, another piece chopped out of us," Mitchell said later

that same night. "The only thing I can imagine that would be

worse is if something happened with Michael Johnson."

I found that interesting too. Checking the historical context, it was before the bust to come later when (I think) Trevor G. testified he Mitchell up HGH, right? Then more recently, Lauren Fleshman had the blog on USATF's selection of Mitchell as a coach.

I'm not picking picking sides in all of this (at least yet).

Sciatica Road wrote:

I'm not picking sides in all of this (at least yet).

I mean, yeah, I understand the unfortunate manifestation of human nature in it all, though I can understand KG's concerns, and Fleshman's concerns....but there are multiple highly nuanced, not black-and-white issues going on here.

I conducted a job interview with a guy called Salazar today. Pretty fast I concluded he was a liar and a cheater so I consequently turned him down. Felt good. LOL!

Seriously... There isn't a NOP doping scandal. Maybe there is a misuse of therapeutic exemptions.

Do you really think that a billion company risks it's name for a silver at the Olympics in 2015?

Nothing there wrote:

Seriously... There isn't a NOP doping scandal. Maybe there is a misuse of therapeutic exemptions.

Do you really think that a billion company risks it's name for a silver at the Olympics in 2015?

Yes, because misusing an exemption is self-contradictory. Winning second place is what life is all about.

anacondarunner wrote:

2) Salazar knows exactly how much Androgel he can use on an athlete without triggering a positive test, as a result of his "sabotage experiment".

.

While the androgel issue is the worst one for Salazar, it is still a "where there is smoke" allegation. If Salazar was going to do an experiment to try to determine the level of microdosing that could escape anti-doping detection, he would not have done it the way he did. First, he would have kept it completely off the radar. No documents. No emails. Use a shady lab for testing (there are plenty of places you can go to find out whether the crank you did last night will show up on your drug test the next day at work without creating any sort of paper trail). But he didn't do that. He was pretty open about his testing. He was also very open about the fact that he had androgel, telling people to be careful about handling his stuff due to the risk of incidental contamination. If he was going to set up a secret microdosing program, he would have kept it completely out of sight and not left a vigorous trail of bread crumbs for everyone to follow. Second, it was fairly widely known in the sporting world in 2006 that it was possible to microdose testosterone without running afoul of the 4:1 testosterone/epitestosterone limit. That was why Victor Conte had people mix the clear with the cream. Does up the testosterone with just enough epitestosterone and everything stays in balance. Why do a very open test to try to figure out how to do what dopers already knew how to do? Third, why risk it with Rupp? Salazar has long recognized that Rupp is a once in a lifetime talent out of the US distance running pool. Salazar has been very protective of Rupp and will not let him race if conditions are not right (thus "Rupp certified ___" was born). If Salazar was going to do an illicit micro dosing program, why would he use Rupp as a guinea pig? Just because you can beat today's test does not mean you can beat tomorrow's. When cycling started using biological passport, positive tests were everywhere and times in the peloton dropped like a stone. The carbon isotope ratio test could be implemented as standard operating procedure at WADA and catch everyone with any synthetic testosterone in their system. Down goes Rupp. Fourth, why not use it on anyone else? Salazar's salary is not based solely on Rupp's performance. Why would he only dope Rupp? Why not Kara? Ritz? Others?

Thus, the argument then really becomes nothing more than Salazar had androgel, Salazar could have used it on Rupp in very isolated micro doses, therefore, Salazar must have doped Rupp. If you are going to take down a lifetime of achievement by an athlete, you do need more than that.

Feelgood wrote:

Gold medals at the highest level turn men and women in twisted ways. Much the same way it twisted the souls of those who came to handle the gold ring on the way to Modor in Tolkien's classic tale. Turns good people into monsters.

This is a just a little melodramatic. More accurate to say it pushes people to interesting places. Sometimes hurts them, sometimes hurts others, but generally creates progress.

What the scandal really boils down to is the anti-doping crusade is illogical and pointless. Sure ban Salazar, take away Rupp's medal. So what? The only really interesting thing is how can we push our limits more with our training technologies, and when's the next epic battle between perfectly matched opponents.

Drugs are not the evil poison everyone makes them out to be. Sure many things CAN be dangerous. It's all about dosage. Misinformation and fearmongering, thanks mainly to the DEA more than anything else, is the evil poison here.

the sleazy wall wrote:

Add to this a wall of secrecy between Al Sal/Rupp and the rest of the athletes.

And if there is real wrongdoing going on, this will be the cause of NOP's downfall. Because what brought down Lance Armstrong was his pyramidal doping structure. Everyone on his team got to share in the rewards, but they were all ultimately in service to Lance who got the best, got first dibs. That sowed the seeds of resentment and anger at unfulfilled promises and few rewards for loyalty, and they spoke out against him.

If we believe those who have spoken out so far, it seems NOP has the same structure....there is AlSal and Rupp, and everyone else. And as the pressure grows (again, assuming there is legit wrong doing going on ) I suspect there will be those in the know who will speak out in order to save themselves and cut lenient deals, like Tyson Gay did in exchange for his cooperation with USADA and USATF.

I wouldn't be surprised if AlSal "retires" soon, avoids the worst of it. But Rupp, I fear, is in very grave danger. He's too closely tied to all of this, and there are a lot of people who, given the right pressure, would turn on him to save themselves.

Precious Roy wrote:

While the androgel issue is the worst one for Salazar, it is still a "where there is smoke" allegation. ... If you are going to take down a lifetime of achievement by an athlete, you do need more than that.

You proved you know absolutely nothing about WADA/USADA and how cheaters are put away. If you think andogel is the only smoke you are wrong.

Use a shady lab for testing (there are plenty of places you can go to find out whether the crank you did last night will show up on your drug test the next day at work without creating any sort of paper trail). But he didn't do that. He was pretty open about his testing.

LOL ... the "open" part is an old diversion trick. Many legit business are a front for secret illegal activities: drug smugglers.

good point that al sal would have avoided a paper trail had he really been sorting out microdosing. No way would he have been so clumsy and obvious.

but

many people think doping is about money - well sometimes it is. But it's usually about glory more than money. If salazar doped Mo and Rupp he did it for that moment in London when they went 1-2. He didn't do it to get another $100,000 from Nike or whatever. So take money out of the equation - it doesn't prove or disprove anything.

Handing out prescription drugs to another person that doesn't have a prescription for that specific drug is against the law. No USADA needed.

http://www.novusdetox.com/prescription-drug-abuse.php

thanks. Dumb question I know...

jaybeel wrote:

What the scandal really boils down to is the anti-doping crusade is illogical and pointless. Sure ban Salazar, take away Rupp's medal. So what? ... Drugs are not the evil poison everyone makes them out to be.

What? The best monied drug team gets to win medals, and make the most money from the sport? No. Sorry. No.

ThisIsFutile wrote:

Handing out prescription drugs to another person that doesn't have a prescription for that specific drug is against the law. No USADA needed.

http://www.novusdetox.com/prescription-drug-abuse.php

thanks. Dumb question I know...

Handing out the prescription drugs is illegal, but worse than that is the amount being handing out far exceeds the amount of prescription that a person has. The extra prescription drugs are coming from somewhere that is not a legit source.

jaybeel wrote:

jaybeel wrote:

What the scandal really boils down to is the anti-doping crusade is illogical and pointless. Sure ban Salazar, take away Rupp's medal. So what? ... Drugs are not the evil poison everyone makes them out to be.

What? The best monied drug team gets to win medals, and make the most money from the sport? No. Sorry. No.

That is not a realistic portrayal of what would happen.

But in general, the team with the best resources overall tends to win on average, right? NY Yankees? This is a fundamental reality that you can't change with our without drugs.

"Oh it does, does it? All these masters guys running in the 16s are clean? Testosterone is a $2 billion market - who do you think buys it?"

You're an idiot. I'm about to turn 36 and just ran sub 15 for the 5k with a freaking developing respiratory infection. This was done on a pretty standard diet with my only supplements being vitamin C, D, and B-12, oh and beer. Decent lifetime runners who turn masters runners should be able to run 16s with their eyes closed. Don't get upset because that gray haired guy just waxed you in your last 5K where you didn't break 17.

Does USADA keep a public record of TUEs?