Meldonium Amnesty

Sharapova letting her money talk?

So much for the war on drugs.

100's of runners who have been intentionally doping for years were notified months before the drug would trigger a positive test now get off the hook? What about the athletes that have lost prize money, team births, and contracts to these cheaters? This is exactly what's wrong with our sport. People intentionally dope with a drug off the radar and their given no penalty. They should have been banned before the drug was even put on the list because they were only taking it for a performance advantage.

What is wrong with WADA. They should have been able to ban these athletes before 2016 with the fact that the athletes, coaches, and doctors were all breaking the ethics of sport by taking it in.

Agree. WADA's primary role seems to be to warn athletes that it's time to switch to something new when they become aware of cheating schemes that become so popular that even WADA learns about them.

Very disappointing to hear. Another victory for the dopers in setting the thresholds of "proof" so high as to make drug testing futile.

I was discussing this with a Russian friend who was trying to say that all countries dope and that the Russians are no different from all other countries in having their national federation basically set up to aid, enable, and protect their athletes doping. I argued that while some American and European athletes certainly dope this is a false equivalence and things are far far worse in Russia. There are at least cases in the West were the countries themselves go after their own athletes and catch their own high profile individuals. Am I wrong? Are there ANY cases where the Russians have EVER done this?

Good.

Look at Sherapowa, she doesn't have HUGE MUESCLES, so evidence is very low that this medication was good for anything. In other words - she had no advantage. Why punish her?

Also, she is one of the icons of tennis and a really attractive women. I don't think she would lie or try to cheat intentionally .

Just my 2ct.

Disappointed with WADA wrote:

I argued that while some American and European athletes certainly dope this is a false equivalence and things are far far worse in Russia.

NOP. America and Europe have far far greater capabilities to innovate new drugs--including PEDs. The #1 drug using country in the world is the USA.

If everyone's cheating, or in this case, lots of people, then just let them all off. That's WADA for you. Oh, but now there are going to be so many heart attacks, right?

Frustrated Observer wrote:

100's of runners who have been intentionally doping for years were notified months before the drug would trigger a positive test now get off the hook? What about the athletes that have lost prize money, team births, and contracts to these cheaters? This is exactly what's wrong with our sport. People intentionally dope with a drug off the radar and their given no penalty. They should have been banned before the drug was even put on the list because they were only taking it for a performance advantage.

What is wrong with WADA. They should have been able to ban these athletes before 2016 with the fact that the athletes, coaches, and doctors were all breaking the ethics of sport by taking it in.

The issue is less the culpability of the meldonium users, but the process through which WADA made their decision.

The other thread discussed at lengths whether there were actual performance enhancements from the drug. There was no performance data, no bod of evidence from studies on actual performance. There was a conceivable benefit from the mechanism, but theoretically possible isn't the same as actual.

WADA banned this drug because it saw that athletes' intentions were performance enhancement. Not on performance data, or as far as I can tell, a real discussion of its mechanism. They have said as much in their press releases related to the Banned List change, and reactions to positive cases.

While I agree whole heartily with this decision, it does not follow their own principles, banning drugs for at least two of these three reasons: harm, performance enhancement, or violations of the spirit of the sport. But even more than those listed principles, they also didn't bring the scientific rigor that they espouse in their philosophy.

The main paper on which WADA made their decision made one mention (IIRC) of how long it stays in the system. Something like a sentence about "a few days". But WADA didn't do a study on how chronic use, dosage, age, gender or any other factor could affect clearance. No one knows for sure if Sharapova, who took it for 11 years, could have stopped on Dec 31, and still tested positive several weeks later.

Even with this major oversight, I'm still with WADA's action. They've taken decisive action before complete evidence was in in the past, with huge success. EPO was banned before an FDA-drug-trial level of evidence was collected, even before there was a test for it. Good. The sport needed decisive action, not delay. Similar situation for Xenon/Argon bans. Not really enough evidence to say for sure that it is harmful, but enough evidence to fit the urgency at hand.

This decision for amnesty is right only because WADA didn't follow through. If they had done the research to show clearance times, even after they decided to ban it, they wouldn't have to give amnesty. If they had anything relevant to back up their "a few days" claim, they wouldn't have to give amnesty. It may be a black eye for WADA, but they don't have to answer to anybody. Black eyes don't matter to them. It sucks for the clean athletes, but remedies the situation for those (few, I'm guessing) athletes who genuinely did stop dosing after January but were still glowing.

Best solution to a bad situation.

Clerk wrote:

The other thread discussed at lengths whether there were actual performance enhancements from the drug. There was no performance data, no bod of evidence from studies on actual performance. There was a conceivable benefit from the mechanism, but theoretically possible isn't the same as actual.

Actual performance enhancement is not required. If it violates the spirit or sport--trying to cheat--, and is detrimental to the health of an athlete--you cannot hurt yourself if you want to--then it can be banned.

It shouldn't matter how long it takes to get the drug out of the athletes system. They are intentionally taking a prescription drug for performance enhancement. There needs to be a complete black and white line that if you are misusing a prescription drug and you don't have a TUE it's an automatic ban. No exceptions and no time to get it out of your system. Russia was giving this to their HS hockey players with their daily vitamins for Christ's sake. This is blatant doping and I see no reason why WADA couldn't have banned every athlete using it as soon as they found out about it. The coaches, managers, and doctors providing this drug should also be punished. What I see is the sport trying to not disrupt status quo before the Olympics and keep up some sort of fake image a clean sport. I don't buy this BS line that keeps getting spread around of "well it may not work so it's not a big deal" as any athlete willing to take pills for heart failure to enhance performance is a CHEATER and a DOPER. Most pathetic of answers to a situation where 100's of athletes have tested positive and prob 1000's are taking it alone in Russia. These team doctors and scientists employed by federations aren't providing sugar pills to HS age kids and their top athletes. They are in the business of creating cocktails of drugs that'll create current and future champions.

What is fascinating is that for decades, Eastern Euro athletes have been taking a drug on a widespread basis, and keeping it completely off the radar in the West. So much for U.S. dopers being far ahead of the Russkies on the doping technology. Alberto must be going "WTF, can't believe I missed this one!"

The problem with the Meldonium ban has all been a matter of timing and publicity. It hurts the cause of anti-doping when the rules look unfair or when it appears that rules can be sprung on athletes without fair notice.

To be fair to athletes, WADA needs a policy that bans of specific drugs start no sooner than 6 months from WADA's announcement of the ban, and there needs to be greater publicity. So in this case, instead of announcing on 9/16/15 that a ban would start 1/1/16, WADA should have started the ban on 3/1/16, and begun a greater publicity effort.

This would only apply to drugs like Meldonium that fall in a category where only specifically identified drugs are banned (in the case of Meldonium, "hormone and metabolic modulators"). For drugs that fall into categories that are entirely banned, like anabolic agents, these drugs are already banned even if a specific drug hasn't been identified by WADA.

B-Sample wrote:

What is fascinating is that for decades, Eastern Euro athletes have been taking a drug on a widespread basis, and keeping it completely off the radar in the West. So much for U.S. dopers being far ahead of the Russkies on the doping technology. Alberto must be going "WTF, can't believe I missed this one!"

What???? If something is completely off the radar in the USA, and it manages to stay off the radar--payoffs, NOP secret labs, etc.--then how would you know that the USA is not far far ahead of the Russians???

Sure, Usada went after Lance, but only because he was so arrogantly brazen about returning to sport time after time (first to cycling, then to triathlon). He didn't take his "we suggest you retire" warning seriously.But now we have the head of IAAF not only personally vouching for the cleanliness of Britain's (well...Monaco's) most famous runner, but also shielding her by appointing her to a high ranking IAAF position. She played the game--she retired after her last suspicious test result instead of staying in the sport and taking a ban. Coe rewarded her with permanent shelter.In other words, your friend was right.

Disappointed with WADA wrote:

Very disappointing to hear. Another victory for the dopers in setting the thresholds of "proof" so high as to make drug testing futile.

I was discussing this with a Russian friend who was trying to say that all countries dope and that the Russians are no different from all other countries in having their national federation basically set up to aid, enable, and protect their athletes doping. I argued that while some American and European athletes certainly dope this is a false equivalence and things are far far worse in Russia. There are at least cases in the West were the countries themselves go after their own athletes and catch their own high profile individuals. Am I wrong? Are there ANY cases where the Russians have EVER done this?

The western powers are asking WADA to back off on the vilification of the Russians. They hadn't thought it through about how it would look claiming the Russians were tanked up on drugs but still managed to lose to the Brits.

Either the Russians weren't doping, doping isn't effective, or.....

Gosh, that's inconvenient.

It shouldn't matter, but it does.

I agree with you. There do need to be more overarching rules than just a list of banned substances. Cycling has a no needle policy; the idea being that there is no therapeutic (as opposed to medical: surgery, etc.) reason to need to use a needle. A "no prescription drugs" without a TUE rule in principle is impossible to monitor. Labs would be under a heavy burden to test for every prescription drug on the market, in addition to the drugs on the banned list. It is impossible to enforce with different rules for prescriptions in different nations.

B-Sample wrote:

What is fascinating is that for decades, Eastern Euro athletes have been taking a drug on a widespread basis, and keeping it completely off the radar in the West. So much for U.S. dopers being far ahead of the Russkies on the doping technology. Alberto must be going "WTF, can't believe I missed this one!"

What makes you think he missed it?

What we can only speculate about NOP we now KNOW about Russia, i.e bribes, secret drugs, systemic drug distribution, etc.. Alberto *may* be doing such things, but several years have not uncovered anything that can be prosecuted, in contrast to the Russians, who if anything have been getting all kinds of hall passes from WADA and IAAF. USADA has actually demonstrated some decent degree of effectiveness (busting Armstrong, Gatlin, Gay etc) whereas RUSADA has been a complete joke all along.

Off the Radar wrote:

B-Sample wrote:

What is fascinating is that for decades, Eastern Euro athletes have been taking a drug on a widespread basis, and keeping it completely off the radar in the West. So much for U.S. dopers being far ahead of the Russkies on the doping technology. Alberto must be going "WTF, can't believe I missed this one!"

What???? If something is completely off the radar in the USA, and it manages to stay off the radar--payoffs, NOP secret labs, etc.--then how would you know that the USA is not far far ahead of the Russians???