This article somewhat leaves more questions than it answers, but an anonymous NOP athlete that isn’t Mo Farah has provided Sportsmail with a drug test from before the 2011 Championships in Daegu that indicates they may have been using EPO. Lee Troop has pointed out on Twitter that “ There were only 4 athletes on the US team and only 2 (max) international athletes that it could be.”
Obviously without more information we have no clue if this was an isolated incident, if this was at the direction of Alberto, etc. But if one athlete comes forward admitting to full on PED abuse with the NOP, is this a sign there will be more coming forward? Are they coming anonymously to journalists rather than participating in the USADA investigation as to not incriminate themselves?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/sportsnews/article-7566649/EPO-linked-Nike-athlete-2011-Oregon-Project-overseen-Alberto-Salazar.html
EPO Linked To NOP Athlete in 2011
Report Thread
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Everyone in that group should be banned lifetime muthafuka
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Sounds like fake news unless they are willing to identify the athlete allegedly involved. And what do they mean by "anomalous blood sample" linked to EPO? If there's not a positive test for EPO, an anomalous blood sample can't be linked to EPO (it can be suggestive of EPO use or blood doping but it can also be the result of altitude training/exposure).
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The athlete is not anonymous and didn’t provide Sportsmail with anything. You could have at least made an attempt to read the article.
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Alright calm down you weenie, English is my second language and while I read the whole article, I misinterpreted the first sentence “An athlete at the Nike Oregon Project... provided an anomalous blood sample in the month of...” to mean that the athlete provided Sportsmail with the blood sample results. Hence how they (Sportsmail) would have the results without them having gone public. Please don’t hurt me Dwayne!
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It wasn't Farah, but you get the implication lol:
"The athlete's identity is known to Sportsmail and was not Mo Farah, who was also part of the NOP at the same time. Farah made his global breakthrough in Daegu when he won gold in the 5,000m, six months after linking up with Salazar." -
The same way that they used to catch people with EPO before they developed a test for it. Like you said, the high red blood cell count is only suggestive, but past a certain limit it can be pretty clear that no amount of altitude could naturally do that to your system. Assuming this athlete had a biological passport, I guess we’d have to see how this blood sample compared to their baseline hematocrit.
And I don’t think it’s fake news by them not providing the athletes name. It may just be a ploy to get more athletes to come forward. The athlete sees that the news is willing to withhold their names, maybe they’ll come forward and spill some more beans. -
I think I know who it is. Not a US athlete.
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Centro and/or Rupp
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Prance Armstrong wrote:
The same way that they used to catch people with EPO before they developed a test for it. Like you said, the high red blood cell count is only suggestive, but past a certain limit it can be pretty clear that no amount of altitude could naturally do that to your system. Assuming this athlete had a biological passport, I guess we’d have to see how this blood sample compared to their baseline hematocrit.
And I don’t think it’s fake news by them not providing the athletes name. It may just be a ploy to get more athletes to come forward. The athlete sees that the news is willing to withhold their names, maybe they’ll come forward and spill some more beans.
Might be the remnants of a smaller transfusion. -
Centro didn't join the Oregon Project until the beginning of 2012, he was still training under the Powell's in 2011. I wouldn't be shocked if Rupp was taking the juice but this story strikes me as it not being Rupp. I feel like Rupp is so out in the open right now that this either would've come up before, or they'd be putting his name on full blast right now. Makes me think it was someone with more limited success in the group
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A bit too early wrote:
Centro didn't join the Oregon Project until the beginning of 2012, he was still training under the Powell's in 2011. I wouldn't be shocked if Rupp was taking the juice but this story strikes me as it not being Rupp. I feel like Rupp is so out in the open right now that this either would've come up before, or they'd be putting his name on full blast right now. Makes me think it was someone with more limited success in the group
NOP athletes in Daegu:
Kara
Galen
Ciaran
Mo -
Is anyone else still chuckling at the NOP bust? Sometimes I wake up chuckling so loudly that my mom comes into the room to check what is happening. What a joke they are. The whole world knows they are clowns now
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I guess Lee is wrong about the number of NOP athletes being 4 US and up to 2 international then? Because Ciaran and Mo are the two international, but that means there are 2 Americans missing unless he's counting Centro and someone else. I find it unlikely though that Kara went through a whole USADA investigation without that coming out, they said it wasn't Mo, I'd think they'd have Galens name all over this if it was him, so I guess it's Ciaran? He did make a "no regrets" post on instagram the other day about NOP and is on Nikes payroll now, so it wouldn't be too shocking.
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Who's this Ciaran?
Let's go back in time wrote:
A bit too early wrote:
Centro didn't join the Oregon Project until the beginning of 2012, he was still training under the Powell's in 2011. I wouldn't be shocked if Rupp was taking the juice but this story strikes me as it not being Rupp. I feel like Rupp is so out in the open right now that this either would've come up before, or they'd be putting his name on full blast right now. Makes me think it was someone with more limited success in the group
NOP athletes in Daegu:
Kara
Galen
Ciaran
Mo -
Idk if you're just being facetious but Ciaran O Lionaird was an Irish Olympian that originally ran for Ron Warhurst at Michigan, then moved onto FSU, and from there went to NOP and ended up with OTC Elite in 2012. He was almost always injured which is why he had eligibility left to go to FSU, and was also what forced him into an early retirement. Obviously this is speculative, and he's always come across as a genuinely cool guy, but IF this was him, the story would probably be: constant injuries led to fitness loss that he wanted to regain and this seemed like the best way to do it.
Funny enough, when I was googling around to get some accurate dates on this, I came across this LR post from 2012. A nice little time capsule.
https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4571564&page=1 -
Fagan got popped for EPO around this time. Did Fagan tell O'L about EPO or O'L tell Fagan? I always thought Fagan got his EPO from Abdi.
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I was just getting into running in 2012 so I had to google the Fagan stuff, but that might bode well for a defense of the Oregon Project if this was Ciaran. Just blame it on an issue with Athletics Ireland, which maybe that's what it actually was. It is weird that the guy only stayed at NOP for a year though, especially after he was the one who approached Alberto to coach him. There are some gems in that thread I linked though about how he left because he didn't want to get on the juice like Mo and Galen lol
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The fact that Nike is basically taking care of Ciaran, by getting him a job and keeping him close, makes me think he might know a thing or two about NOP. If this guy was doping on his own, Nike would have no issues throwing him under the bus.
Also never forget... NOTHING happened at NOP without Salazar's knowledge. This guy is the biggest control freak. -
Sounds like the early stages of microdosing. Clearly Salazar got it right after this little oopsy.
