LRC “interviews” Shelby about burrito defense and doping

Thanks. I had only looked at the 2006 paper. That 2009 paper has quite the dramatic spike. It wouldn't take much of a boar kidney inside a burrito to reach 5 to 7 range. Does it matter if it's 19-NA S versus 19-NA G? Or does it all count as 19-NA?

I find this the most interesting part of the interview:

[They said] the levels that you tested positive at, it is a very real possibility that it is contamination. So what we (USADA) believe the protocol should have been is you should not have been notified and continued getting tested like seven times over the next six months — I don’t remember exactly the protocol, but like that. And that should tell tell us if this was a one-time contamination thing or if you’re actually cheating.
So that’s what we were originally trying to argue — we don’t feel like this was  handled to protocol.  Unfortunately it seems like protocol is up to the organization’s interpretation, which is a little frustrating.

Houlihan seems to think that USADA would not have charged her after the first positive test, but just increased testing. But that can't be (at least not consistently) so, as the cases of Knighton, Mead and Roberts show. It was also be quite scandalous, actually.

The wording isn't quite clear though. Maybe that USADA person just expressed a personal opinion that "the protocol should have been..." but it is not (and both the AIU and USADA follow the same protocol)?

JG - can you clarify?

When this came out in 2021, the usual claim was that ingestion is not as effective as injection, not that it has 0 effect.

But again, since we do not know what she took, how much she took, when she took it, and how often she took it, that is a very hypothetical discussion.

In case you haven't seen it, this is what letsrun's paid consultant Prof. Tucker wrote on that question:

I think it's because Ayotte used the newer procedures before they became effective and I think before they were even approved. There's the TD2019-NA document that was effective in Dec 2020 and 2 versions of the TD2021-NA document with version 2 being effective right before the trial in June 2021. It looks a bit shady.

I don't presume she doped. She tested positive with no legitimate excuse despite being given the opportunity to provide one. She doped.

When she said she "didn't know" if it was tainted supplements she is admitting there's is NO evidence to show it was that. So that rules out another possible excuse. Burritos didn't cut it either. No way out for Shelby.

You cannot follow legal arguments. CAS didn't presume what it didn't know; it required her to show legitimate cause for testing positive. She couldn't, therefore she committed a confirmed violation. Her failure to discharge an onus of proof is what confirmed that violation. You have no idea how legal processes work.

There is no way her violation could have fallen within the category of "no case to answer"; she tested positive - this was confirmed - and like any athlete she was held responsible for what was found in her body. There is the case to answer. She was required to produce an acceptable excuse or the violation was confirmed. She failed to do so. Contrary to your confused thinking, it wasn't the burden of CAS to prove an ADRV but for her to show it wasn't a violation once it was established she had a banned drug in her system.

You can't follow how the system actually works but construct arguments based in your own misunderstandings of the process, your distortions and misstatements of the facts and your delusional fantasies.

I looked at her 2006 paper again. It mentions 160 ng/mL, but I didn't see that in the pair of studies from 2000 that she referenced. I've wondered if she just makes honest mistakes sometimes.

Good catch! I think that 160ng/ml could be a mistake or could refer to testing by the author that the public does not have access to (which is most of the WADA testing).

I'm convinced that Dr. Ayotte and WADA witnesses were willing to say whatever was needed to win their case no matter what the consequences to potential innocent athletes. I do not feel that in most cases there were innocent mistakes for the following reasons (my personal opinion, of course):

1. Ayotte testified with one set of facts in an April 17, 2019 hearing (IAAF v Maria Guadalupe Gonzalez, 2019) and told the complete opposite story at a hearing just two days later, April 19, 2019 (IAAF v Lawson) -- not just slightly different testimony, but the opposite!

2. At the Lawson's CAS hearing (2020), there were several points laid out showing false testimony by Ayotte, enough to disregard her testimony in that area.

3. At the ITIA v Tara Moore and Barbara Gatica hearing (2023), this is what was said about Ayotte's testimony:

"Professor Ayotte gave oral evidence. It was to her that on two previous occasions other tribunals had not accepted her evidence on similar issues. One of those cases was Lawson, to which we have already referred and where the finding speaks for itself. We not that in the second case (29) to which reference was made, the first instance decision was subject to appeal and so we say no more about it.

"Despite reservations which may have been expressed by other tribunals, we prefer to approach Professor Ayotte's evidence with an open mind, making no assumptions against her. We do comment, however, that the way in which she gave evidence was sub-optimal. Rather than answering the questions that were put directly to her, her style was to respond in the way in which a lecturer might engage in debate in the course of a siminar. At times, she strayed from what should have been the role of independent and dispassionate expert into that of an advocate.

"In essence, we found that her evidence was of no particular assistance, and it is also fair comment that she is not entirely independent when offering opinion based on the analyses which she herself oversaw in the Montreal study (30)."

4. Ayotte was against any finger-pointing directed at WADA in the aftermath of the Russian doping scandal. But she was more focused on regrouping and showing a "united front" with the IOC rather than any organizational self-reflection as she told ESPN in 2016.

5. Ayotte was the one to decide on the disputed testing protocol for Houlihan. One of the three CAS lawyers agreed that the wrong testing protocol was used at Ayotte's lab. It was Houlihan's lawyer, Paul Greene who exposed the fact that there was false testimony in the Lawson case creating a reputational issue for Ayotte. As soon as Ayotte found out that Paul Greene was representing Houlihan (probably around the time of testing the B sample, or before), she should have had decisions about testing protocol transferred to another lab to avoid this gigantic conflict of interest. Not only did she not do this, but she was also the "expert witness" as to why her testing protocol was correct.

6. As I posted on 2/21/2025 in this thread (with links), scientists discovered that a WADA lab had fabricated evidence in three ways for a CAS hearing. When that was discovered, instead of opening an immediate investigation, the president of the organization representing all 35 WADA labs secretly sent a letter to advertisers of the periodical publishing this information (Lab Times) and warned the advertisers (lab equipment manufacturers) that their business reputation might suffer due to this article. The person who threatened the advertisers is still a WADA lab director and is part of a WADA Working Group. This is the type of activity of an organization that thinks it is an unassailable fiefdom.

7. As I mentioned above, one of the three CAS lawyers voted with Houlihan that an inappropriate testing procedure was used. At best, the nandrolone technical document from 2021 is ambiguous. It has been almost 4 years since the split CAS vote and verdict and the same ambiguous nandrolone technical document has not changed. To me, it demonstrates that they are focused on winning cases and have no concern about the CAS arbiter who voted that the testing was done wrong. It appears that now that Houlihan's ban is done, WADA now has a nandrolone working group to eventually suggest changes (sometime in 2026).

8. In the medical communiy (outside of under-funded WADA and sports scientists), there would be no one who would take seriously studies on groups of three people to determine maximum urinary values, especially when those values exhibit as much as 600% difference between each person. Statements from Ayotte and WADA discussing "maximum values found" were especially deceptive, but made good public relations.

9. In 2020, Jonathan Taylor, the former chair of the WADA Compliance Review Committee and former World Athletics counsel wrote an editoral in Law In Sport about the Lawson CAS hearing. He is entitled to his opinion, of course. But what was striking is there was no mention or concern about the false testimony by Ayotte as laid out in the Lawson CAS report. Sports attorneys, Howard Jacobs and Lindsay Brandon wrote a competing editorial in that magazine.

10. WADA is supposed to have an "ethics committe" but there seems to be no mention of the Lawson hearing or their attack on Lab Times in the minutes of their meetings.

The good news is that WADA will definately catch more intentional dopers (with accompanying press releases), but they will inevitably "catch" and destroy the lives and reputations of more unintentional or completely innocent "dopers." Going forward, the rumor is that they will set their 2027 guidelines so that only drinking water or lake water can cause a "no fault" positive test and it seems that they may be getting ready to misuse Bradley Johnson's new research that looks for *widespread* meat contamination and apply it to outliers (but I hope I'm wrong about that!). It makes me wonder if they're focused on re-litigating the Lawson case in the court of public opinion.

There are a number of simple steps that they could take to make the process better and more fair for the athletes which could lead to stakeholders giving them more money for research. They would have to accept some comprimise, but in the end (over several decades), I believe it will lead to *less* doping and more pure joy in sport.

Wow! She is quite the character. Curious to hear more about points 1 and 6 if you feel like it.

You may have noticed that Brad Johnson found nandrolone in a pork kidney just by having his grad student drive around 8 US cities purchasing meat and transporting them with dry ice. I doubt it was 10,000 samples, and this was after the pandemic.

Unfortunately I don't think WADA and AIU really want to catch the big dopers because it's bad for sports business. The biological passport has a major flaw exposed in the Bejder 2016 paper that could easily be fixed by swapping primary and secondary biomarkers, and the Cox 2021 paper proposed a major improvement that isn't being used because it's too good. It's a buzz-kill "party's over" level of improvement. 🙁 And no testing for 2 HIF stabilizers, weak testing for a 3rd, and no procedures or decision limits for AICAR-related testing despite advanced research. 🤷‍♂️

The small sample sizes are strange because these are easy studies. How hard can it be to feed people some food or supplement and have them piss in a cup a few times? That's nothing compared to nutritional and exercise studies lasting weeks, months, years, with very detailed protocols and adjustments for unexpected things.

I did notice that Bradley Johnson found 19-NA (nandrolone metabolite) in a pork kidney. I would guess that there were =< 41 samples of pork, but we’ll have to wait and see. He attributed it to uncastrated boar as you know from the “Anti-Doping Podcast.” It shows the danger of wild scientific speculation at hearings.

Great idea for his study, but the biggest danger to athletes come in the podcast from 28:40 - 30:00. He seems to be proposing to use the non-outlier, no- or low-contamination meat results to calculate how much meat would have needed to be eaten. He’ll be able to testify for WADA/AIU that athlete x would have had to eat a truckload of beef (for example). The problem with that is meat contamination in the U.S. would be outliers. His study is far too small to pick up outliers (except he picked up an uncastrated boar, which shows it could be far more widespread than we thought). The CAS will likely eat up nonsense testimony and it may be even more impossible for an athlete to win a meat contamination case.

I’d like to go to his research presentation on April 1st, but I’m not going to spend $195 (virtual) or $395 (MLB Headquarters).

Thanks for the references on the biological passport. I don’t remember if I saw them. Speaking of biological passports, it seems like this research:

https://www.dshs-koeln.de/fileadmin/redaktion/Institute/Biochemie/PDF/Proceedings/Proceedings_28/Recent_Advances_in_Doping_Analysis_28_2020.pdf.pdf

See page 84. They are trying to take ideas from biological passports and apply it to cases like the Houlihan case where she had a positive test (AAF) for an anabolic androgenic steroid (AAS): nandrolone. They show that bilirubin increases and other medical problems can follow. The idea seems to be that testing for bilirubin can help confirm regular AAS use — at least that’s what I think they’re trying to say. As pointed out in this article and I mentioned in my editorial, a bilirubin increase could be a very serious problem for someone with her dual medical condition. Counterproductive if she wants to stay healthy and run fast, IMO.

That is unfortunate, but the AIU wasn't acting, and the trials deadline was approaching.

It is just another demonstration of the imbalance of power granted to anti-doping organizations by the WADA Code. The AIU denied the requested extension, and denied all requests to expedite the process, or temporary lift the suspension to permit competing in the US trials. There is no incentive or obligation for the AIU to act in a responsive timely manner, and no negative repurcussions for dragging their feet.

None of that is necessary to reach the conclusion that she was railroaded to a 4-year ban based on a set of presumptions lacking a critical mass of facts -- the CAS made that explicit.

Remind me again, who trolled us with "Who said she didn't use testo + HGH + nandro + xyz?"

I would like to go with the facts -- that is why I am so critical of an imbalanced process that makes decisions based on presumptions without first conducting a fact-finding exercise.

The few facts specific to this case are ambiguous, as her test results are "consistent with" both an "endogenous" source, and a "pseudo-endogenous 19-norsteroid preparation".

The quote you provided from Gault only confirms my point: "Houlihan's team is arguing that it has some relevance because it shows that organs contain a much higher concentration than regular meat." Both "expert witnesses" for the AIU know this, but neglected to share these facts with the CAS, who rendered decisions that go against these facts.

Fixed it for ya👀

Not quite. Prof. Ayotte said the opposite: that they applied the TD2019NA, while the principle of "Lex Mitior" says that the TD2021NA applies once published, even before it officially takes effect, when it is more favorable to the athlete.

Yet both the TD2019NA and the TD2021NA explicitly state that ingestion of nandrolone from pork is considered by WADA as "endogenous" -- i.e. not doping. The TD2021NA makes it more clear, that the GC/C/IRMS cannot determine the (endogenous/exogenous) origin if it is potentially confounded by pork ingestion.

Not quite sure I understand what protocol Houlihan is describing. Any finding of an ATF, rather than an AAF, is only possible when the athlete invokes pork consumption, which would only be possible by notifying the athlete. Any failure of the WADA Lab to follow WADA's protocol would be in their reporting of the B-sample results, after Houlihan invoked pork consumption. In this case, "The origin of the urinary 19-NA may not be established by GC/IRMS analysis ..."

In Houlihan's case, we ended up with a kind of circular argument, where the ends were used to justify the means. The athlete burden to establish the source only begins when the athlete is properly charged with an ADRV. But the ADRV cannot be properly charged without the GC/C/IRMS result determining exogenous origin. But the exogenous origin cannot be determined by GC/C/IRMS analysis, if it is confounded by pork consumption. The athlete burden at this early B-sample testing stage, before the ADRV, before the AAF, is "athlete invocation". The WADA Lab is not authorized to consider the likelihood of pork consumption, and the AIU is burdened with establishing the ADRV to the higher standard of "comfortable satisfaction" based on the WADA Lab reporting, subject to WADA's standards.

I don't find your revisionist history particularly compelling. The CAS told us the presumptions they relied on.

The AIU and the CAS presumed she doped, and doped intentionally. The CAS told us so.

Yet, the AIU doesn't know, and the CAS doesn't know. They made presumptions and then made allegations and findings based on these presumptions, because there is NOTHING to support it.

Of course I can follow legal arguments -- they are not so complicated as you like to pretend -- and I can tell when findings are not based on facts, especially when the CAS tells us their findings are direct consequences of presumptions.

You keep saying "positive test", and "confirmed positive test", yet the CAS told us that this was the first presumption.

I don't say the burden to establish that an ADRV occurred is on the CAS, but the AIU.

One way to conclude "no case to answer" is to determine that the WADA Lab deviated from the WADA standards, and that the AIU failed to meet their burden that an ADRV occurred. On this point, this CAS Panel was split 2:1. With a different CAS Panel, who might have consulted a neutral expert witness to help interpret WADA's intent, rather than asking the lab if they could have made a mistake, a 1:2 split or a 0:3 finding would result in "no case to answer".

A presumption is a conclusion based on facts, in this case, many overwhelming facts vs wildly creative fairytales