Bump
Bump
Not sure about the case from 7 years ago but doping does happen at the high school level in many sports and it's a bit silly to assume it hasn't happened in XC and track too.
ActualHScoach wrote:
As of this past weekend I've been told by a person whom I trust would never lie to me that a prominent high school distance runner from my state engaged in a practice that can only be described as blood doping this past fall. My source received this information first hand from the doper and said that they believed that under the rules of our state it was technically legal but wouldn't be in a situation above the high school level (NCAA or anything falling under USADA's watch). The athlete in question apparently was iron deficient and anemic and treated this by receiving blood transfusions of non-anemic blood. This was done with a doctors help and apparently took more then one treatment. What's more, this athlete had an underwhelming performance at an important invitational, did not compete for a good length of time and then came back with two phenomenal (bordering on unbelievable) performances in a row. The remainder of this athletes season was an unequivocal success and this has resulted in some very high praise and honors that that now seem to me to be undue and ill gotten. I now find this athletes accomplishments to be despicable and am not looking forward to the 'victory lap' of a track campaign that will take place this spring. Sadly, I have always suspected something was amiss with this athlete as he/she does not attend the high school they are supposed to but rather one where the coaching staff allowed mom to be coach and the schools actual coach does not actually do the coaching for this particular athlete. Apparently landing at this school involved some shopping around to find the 'right fit' to obtain this situation, which strikes me as somewhat wrong itself.
My question is this, what should I do with this information? I don't believe USADA has jurisdiction to do anything about this and as a coach from another high school I worry about what happens to my reputation if I do something like going to the local paper about it. I'm not bitter about not having this athlete on my team and just trying to ruin his/her name. They aren't even in the same classification as my school. It just doesn't sit right with me to see these honors lumped upon this athlete when I know it wasn't a level playing field for her competition.
I have been intentionally as vague about details that might give away which athlete I'm talking about to avoid dragging their name through the mud but if additional information is needed to help me figure out how to deal with this I can provide it.
Rules matter. If he didn't break any rules, then it isn't cheating. Get over it.