Should we just give up and find a new sport? Gabby Thomas - formerly of Harvard - receives doping ban for missing 3 tests

She has a pattern of failing to follow the rules. It's her responsibility to make sure she is accessible as possible for the drug testers.

The burden is on the athlete, not the drug testers. The drug testers aren't bounty hunters.

Well, we've quantified the impact of doping and it's no greater than the impact of legal doping (altitude training) or mechanical doping (carbon plated shoes).

I will always be a fan. It is entertainment. I love Lance Armstrong. I love Seb Coe. I love Usain Bolt and I love Jenny Simpson. I compete to the highest level of my abilities and I know I have advantages others don't that would be considered doping (I have the wealth and resources to see a therapist 1 x per week; have access to expensive weights; have access to clean, organic fresh meats and vegetables; have access to liquid iron supplementation and Advil, if needed).

Just have sport. Doping does not impact everyone is the same way so let nature dictate the cards. One guy could dope and you get a 2% gain; the other a 0% gain. Watch Icarus and you'll learn a little bit more and/or just look at the history book in sports. Records are separated by fractions of seconds.

Cheating? At Hahvahd?

https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/3/14/admissions-national-investigation/

Here's the thing. They allow two penalty-free whereabouts failures to protect an athlete from being popped for a single uncharacteristic slip-up. But the third failure? I have a hard time splitting hairs about how or why. It's the third failure.

Rojo, don't fall for it. Read one of the earlier posts about how athletes should realistically be treating the whereabouts failures. Even getting two failures shows one of two things: either purposeful evasion or complete, utter stupidity.

Perhaps I'm giving her too much credit between the ears, but I'd think it's probably not the latter.

Is this as bad as cheating to get into Yale and Princeton?

I know Gabby and she didn’t understand all of the rules. Her WhereAbouts were updated, but she was unaware that of the 60 minute window rule and thought that testers could come whenever they wanted throughout the day.

She has been tested a lot more than other elite athletes as well. The real issue here is that nobody told her the expectations or gave her a rule book, because she was at Harvard and clearly didn’t have a slight clue to what she was doing as a pro.

anonn wrote:

I know Gabby and she didn’t understand all of the rules. Her WhereAbouts were updated, but she was unaware that of the 60 minute window rule and thought that testers could come whenever they wanted throughout the day.

She has been tested a lot more than other elite athletes as well. The real issue here is that nobody told her the expectations or gave her a rule book, because she was at Harvard and clearly didn’t have a slight clue to what she was doing as a pro.

This could explain the first failure, but the third? Wouldn't she want to discover what the rules were after the first mistake? Or the second?

These (missed) tests seem to have taken place while she was still studying at Harvard, as her wherabouts stated New Haven, Connneticut as her residence. You have a pretty regulated life still going to class and training within certain time frames. You will set your one hour window (3 months in advance) at a place and location where you are consistently likely to be in the same place such at 7am at your home or 2pm at the practice track.

You have to be in the vicinity of that place for the suration of that one hour, and Gabby said that she was in the vicinity (open to some interpretation) on one occasion, but at the exact location on the second occasion. The onus is also on the Tester to make every effort to find her and make contact within that one hour slot. I think in the US that they will even phone or text within that hour to make contact. If she has evidence and witnesses that she was at that location when the tester came to call, but nobody heard the bell ring, then there is a reasonable argument to be made for an appeal.

The problem is always that some people may choose to hide when the testers come a knocking!

reel tok wrote:

American Fake Tan wrote:

I told y'all the Brits were dirty! When is snooty Lord Coe going to come clean about the Bradley Wiggins package? Kick them out of the sport and stop robbing Galen of gold medals!!

Coevett, the three best endurance athletes ever from GB are/were dirty. You are not above reproach.

+1

American Fake Tan = Coevett, the coward who called people cowards for posting without a registered handle.

It's obvious you are not a fan, nor have you been a fan of the best runners in the US for ten years. Why don't you just go away,. This site did nothing to promote running.

anonn wrote:

I know Gabby and she didn’t understand all of the rules. Her WhereAbouts were updated, but she was unaware that of the 60 minute window rule and thought that testers could come whenever they wanted throughout the day.

She has been tested a lot more than other elite athletes as well. The real issue here is that nobody told her the expectations or gave her a rule book, because she was at Harvard and clearly didn’t have a slight clue to what she was doing as a pro.

She's an adult making a lot of money as a pro athlete. She didn't fulfill the requirements of her job - learning the rules and taking drug tests. Even after 2 strikes, she didn't bother to learn the rules when faced with a suspension for another missed test.

But of course, her excuses sound exactly like what a DOPER would say as an excuse for skipping a test.

anonn wrote:

I know Gabby and she didn’t understand all of the rules. Her WhereAbouts were updated, but she was unaware that of the 60 minute window rule and thought that testers could come whenever they wanted throughout the day.

She has been tested a lot more than other elite athletes as well. The real issue here is that nobody told her the expectations or gave her a rule book, because she was at Harvard and clearly didn’t have a slight clue to what she was doing as a pro.

I hope this is a troll post. It is her job to understand the rules. It is her job to follow the rules. If you don't understand your job, it is your responsibility to ask the appropriate questions that help you understand your job and do your job correctly. It isn't anyone else's responsibility but your own to make sure the job is done correctly. That is the way life works. And yes, people make mistakes, which is only human, but that is why the first violation (and second violation!) isn't an auto punishment. Plus this isn't some obscure rule. In fact, it was just highlighted all over the place in the media because of Coleman. That should have been a red flag to anyone who "doesnt understand" the rule to take the time to understand the rule. So sorry, no sympathy here.

I resent the insinuation that Harvard runners are more ethical than the rest of us. Some of you may remember Jane Seo: https://www.marathoninvestigation.com/2017/02/runner-disqualified-after-claiming-2nd.html

anonn wrote:

I know Gabby and she didn’t understand all of the rules. Her WhereAbouts were updated, but she was unaware that of the 60 minute window rule and thought that testers could come whenever they wanted throughout the day.

She has been tested a lot more than other elite athletes as well. The real issue here is that nobody told her the expectations or gave her a rule book, because she was at Harvard and clearly didn’t have a slight clue to what she was doing as a pro.

I believe that you know her are you are posting from Austin where she was training.

What I don't get is that she'd be unaware. If that's true, what on earth are agents doing to earn their commissions? Her agent is Paul Doyle. He's been fighting the Jarrion Lawson case for a long time. If any agent in the world would be telling someone how important it is to follow these rules, you'd think it would be him.

And I can understand your argument for 1 missed test. But I just don't believe that it would be the case after #2. The argument seems to be she just never knew the drug tester was there. The argument of , "She didn't understand the rules for #3" is a really bad one for me since she's a Harvard alum. I mean come on.

tin can man wrote:

Not sure why you make it seem surprising that an Ivy League athlete would ever cheat. The school you went to does not make you a more moral person than the next athlete.

Yes the Ivy League has a proud history of people who would never operate in the moral grey areas: Bush family, Bill & Hillary Clinton, Dick Cheney Barack, Trump, Obama, John Kerry, the Kennedys, et al.

sir scrohan wrote:

tin can man wrote:

Not sure why you make it seem surprising that an Ivy League athlete would ever cheat. The school you went to does not make you a more moral person than the next athlete.

Yes the Ivy League has a proud history of people who would never operate in the moral grey areas: Bush family, Bill & Hillary Clinton, Dick Cheney Barack, Trump, Obama, John Kerry, the Kennedys, et al.

Their School of Public Health has some of the most vile snakes in all of academia.

how does her phone GPS data prove anything? even if she was there she could have just not answered the door if she knew she was glowing

reed wrote:

how does her phone GPS data prove anything? even if she was there she could have just not answered the door if she knew she was glowing

Had the same thought as this, or even more sinisterly, left the phone at the correct location and skipped town.

One of the biggest problems arising from these whereabouts failures that are cleared (especially if actually innocent) is that dirty athletes who evade tests slip past public scrutiny by resting on the fact that *clean* athletes also fail whereabouts testing.

I think if an athlete misses 3 tests in a year, even if only because of stupidity, they need to be held accountable.

If world class athletes like Jenny Simpson think missing 3 in a year is unacceptable and suspicious, then I believe her. ( and I’m not even a Jenny stan, but in this case/Coleman’s case think she is absolutely correct )