Shelby Houlihan: "I want to be very clear. I’ve never taken any performance-enhancing substances"

We know all athletes are taking substances that will improve or the belief it will improve their performance.

This could be something as simple as iron or vitamins C tablets, or something more, approved, in the grey or banned. We know the USA athletes are all doing this like all other countries athletes - I bet you were doing this too Rojo!

Simple, you are responsible for what you put in your body regardless how it got there, you were found out, you were banned.

There is a 0.0000% chance that Shelby Houlihan, in her build up to the Olympics, went out on the street to a food truck and ate a Mexican mystery meat burrito. She was notified that she needed to be available for testing, she knew that she had just did a cycle where she was roidin' hard and she needed an excuse. There is absolutely no way she would have gone to that truck and eaten a burrito on purpose. Stop it!

she had tell tale signs of doping galore! jaw,adams apple,sunken looks,body shape,musclularity combined with leanness.

sbeefyk2 wrote:

It is irrelevant if she actually ate food. Are people not realizing you can dope and then go out and eat pork and then use that as the excuse? That’s why they have to draw a line in the sand. Athletes will dope all they want and go eat pork every day and save the receipts and say, look it’s just the food.

The fact is simple. Shelby cheated. And tried to hide it by eating a burrito and showing evidence she ate a burrito. After all, who saves receipts from eating burritos? Nobody. Unless your lawyer told you to save it for your future doping case because he’s supplying you with PED’s. .

You are making assumptions without knowing all of the facts. It's quite possible she went to her credit card company to get the receipt. zBut would that receipt show what item she purchased? Those are the type of details Id' want to know. the lawyer told us they have geo locations from her phone.

To me, if she ate pork 8 hours before and it's written in scientific literature that her test would be just as it was, then I'm letting her off. But they didn't let her off so I want to know why.

YOu are just assuming it's made up without knowing the facts. I'm not going to do that.

But your point about always having this as an excuse is why we've called for the rules to be changed. We keep having cases like this - wilson, lawson, etc. It's crazy.They need to either stop testing for such small amounts or tell people not to eat certain foods. "Dear athletes, the following foods are known to cause positive tests. Do not eat them. Any excuses will not be tolerated."

The reality is you think the excuse is made up. And you think anyone could claim pork but that's only if they have a tiny amount of it in their system.

But I agree it could be a convenient excuse for all people going forward. That's why I want the rules changed period.

But here, I want to see the proof in this case. It's my understanding WADA accepted she ate the pork and still banned her. We need to know why.

You need to wait until the full decision comes out. I also want to see the polygraph and hair sample results. Most people claiming innocence don't take polygraphs.

But the first paragraph is why I saw reform has to happen. They must either change the testing sensitivity or tell people not to eat certain foods.

sbeefyk2 wrote:

It is irrelevant if she actually ate food. Are people not realizing you can dope and then go out and eat pork and then use that as the excuse? That’s why they have to draw a line in the sand. Athletes will dope all they want and go eat pork every day and save the receipts and say, look it’s just the food.

No, the point is that if eating reasonable amounts of the normal food supply can actually trigger WADA's arbitrary limits, then WADA's limit are WAY TOO LOW. The limits should be set so that someone would have to eat some outrageous amount of meat, like four or five steaks in one setting. If one steak trips the limits, then that is way too low, and the process is a sham.

We need actual facts on what minimal amounts of meat can actually trigger WADA's limits.

rojo wrote:

You are making assumptions without knowing all of the facts.

YOu are just assuming it's made up without knowing the facts. I'm not going to do that.

ALSO rojo...in the same thread:

rojo wrote:

I had the guts to ask Regina Jacobs about why she pulled out of the Olympics daysafter an EP0 test was announced. It was so obvious to me she was a doper yet all the meet promoters justaccepted her with open arms.

I knew she was a doper without proof.

uhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....wut?

Yes, thank you.

only 16 people in history of sport have ever knowingly taken PEDs

…the rest are just victims of circumstance

hmmmm mmmm wrote:

rojo wrote:

You are making assumptions without knowing all of the facts.

YOu are just assuming it's made up without knowing the facts. I'm not going to do that.

ALSO rojo...in the same thread:

rojo wrote:

I had the guts to ask Regina Jacobs about why she pulled out of the Olympics daysafter an EP0 test was announced. It was so obvious to me she was a doper yet all the meet promoters justaccepted her with open arms.

I knew she was a doper without proof.

uhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....wut?

Regina Jacobs: Black

Shelby Houlihan: White

Duh!

Wada can't get into the business of recommending foods and supplements to avoid

They will just be digging a hole for themselves

i find it remarkable that many of the very same people who destroyed salazar and slandered openly anyone who trained under him now attack the testing system. that fiasco was led by disgruntled athletes who are now attack foreign athletes with absolutely no proof. they sound like spiro agnew. the press conference was a rehearsed joke.

rojo wrote:

To me, if she ate pork 8 hours before and it's written in scientific literature that her test would be just as it was, then I'm letting her off. But they didn't let her off so I want to know why.

Ummm.... both the AIU and CAS know why, and will tell us soon.

More interestingly: why was her ban kept secret until after CAS? Highly unusual! See Kiprop and Kipsang and Coleman and and and ... :

Lots of decisions are published there that are still appealable or are "Under CAS Appeal".

2020 was a weird year. You have people "doping" with super shoes. The punishment is too harsh IMO.

AIU should amend the punishment as follows:

1. 2 year ban.

2. The remaining 2 years she should be handicapped in all of her races by some x% time added for

based on how much we think nandrolone might have helped her.

3. Ban use of supershoes during the 4 year punishment cycle.

4. Ban any international competition for life with exception being allowance for 2024 Olympics because 2020 was a weird year and this double-olympic ban is exceptionally cruel and unusual. The performance gain from Nandrolone is not as egregious as EPO.

5. Allowance for domestic competitions only.

Rojo: Lets save someone's career this week. Make the calls and put pressure on USADA to apply pressure on AIU. You have connections.

As I've posted elsewhere, the contaminated meat hypothesis is bogus in Shelby's case and in general.

Eating pork from normal food supply will NOT cause elevated Nandralone readings.

Only the liver/offal of non castrated male pigs contain high level of nandralone.

Almost all pigs in the US are castrated to begin with and the number of people who eat pig liver is so small that WADAs limits are entirely reasonable.

Almost zero chance there’s a food truck selling pig kidney/liver/brain/heart. Intestine/stomach? Sure maybe, it’s great when done well (menudo etc). I own a large butcher shop, very rare to see much pig offal make it out of the usda slaughterhouses (all animals that are to be sold must be killed in a usda slaughterhouse). Most offal we see on US tables are 99% beef.

I’m not sure what organs in the pig carry enough load of steroid to have someone test positive. From what I’ve read it seems like the standard shoulder/butt from a contaminated pig would not get you popped. That being said, if it’s only the liver and the kidney it would be extremely rare to see that bought from anywhere. (Also, pig kidney is gnarly and I’ve only had it done edible in Szechuan cuisine). If this food truck really has a pig offal burrito, sign me up, would love to have it. Kinda want to see it on a menu to believe it though.

An elite athlete eating dodgy junk food as part of their regime, declaring a doping test fake news and then blaming the mexicans. Truely we are in the post-Trump world!

This is correct. The cheapest available pork in the US (in my experience what most restaurants use) has almost zero chance of being contaminated in this way. Factory farms castrate their pigs have the strictest usda inspectors in slaughterhouse.

Again, show me the pig liver burrito on a menu and I’ll stfu.

GnomeBe wrote:

I honestly think she is innocent.

A lot of 2:19 800m guys think not.

what do you run to know the truth? 2.15?

jeff tallon wrote:

she had tell tale signs of doping galore! jaw,adams apple,sunken looks,body shape,musclularity combined with leanness.

Coaches associated (fairly or not here) with Salazar.....