Doping in Sport - Bi-Weekly Press round-up #139
The French media investigates Pogacar's team manager, a US Olympic medallist tests positive and an international footballer's possessions were searched during his doping case.
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Every Monday and Thursday, I send a newsletter to your inbox with the URLs to all the major doping stories in the press over the past seven days. You can find an example post here (link).
With Wimbledon starting today, I published an article on the 16 Wimbledon finalists, including five juniors, who have faced doping cases during their career. “Despite this influx of cases, the current director of tennis anti-doping programme Nicole Sapstead believes ‘the vast majority of players compete clean’,” (link).
The Times interviewed Serena William’s former coach Patrick Mouratoglou who was working with Simona Halep when she inadvertently tested positive for the blood doping agent roxadustat. “She argued that the banned stimulant had been ingested via a contaminated supplement that was given to her by a member of Mouratoglou’s team,” (link). This week, Law in Sport published a detailed analysis of Halep’s case which also involved a second Athlete Biological Passport charge (link).
The Daily Mail published an article titled ‘Jannik Sinner's three-month drugs ban from tennis felt all too convenient, too light on the fading principle of strict liability...excuse those of us rooting for Carlos Alcaraz at Wimbledon’. “Sinner? It was one of the most astonishing and unique chronologies I’ve heard in these doping discussions; the kind that warranted extreme diligence before even considering a decision to tag and release, irrespective of the concentration levels in a sample. Eight days,” (link).
Radio France reports that the team manager of UAE Team Emirates Mauro Gianetti, whose star rider is Tadej Pogacar, was allegedly injected with perfluorocarbons (PFC) in 1998 according to a confession in his medical file. PFCs are effectively ‘synthetic blood’ (link) and they boost the oxygen carrying capacity of the body similarly to blood doping agents. Through speaking to judicial sources, the French media outlet has shed new light on the scandal which was heavily reported on at the time of the events. “Clearly, his approach was aimed at allowing him to intervene as a party to the criminal proceedings, not for the purpose intended by the legislature, but to better control the proceedings or even thwart them. There was a desire on his part to cover things up. Clearly, he wanted to get involved in the proceedings to find out who had testified against him (link). Diario del Triatlon (link), RMC Sport (link), the Escape Collective (link) and Liberation have reported on the story (link). In 2019, the UAE Team Emirates cyclist Kristijan Đurasek was caught blood doping as part of an Austrian police investigation in 2019 (link).
The Team Visma sports director Frans Maasen, who was also employed by the team when it implemented a systematic doping programme (link), says he considered doping during his own career but ultimately refrained from doing so. “I never fully understood how EPO could make such a difference, how it could make you noticeably stronger. Today we don't experience that extreme rigidity, but back then its use was widespread within the peloton,” (link).
The winner of the 2023 Vuelta a Venezuela, César Sanabria, has been banned for doping and consequently suspended from the race. “It has awarded the 2023 Vuelta a Venezuela title to cyclist Cleiver Martínez, a member of Team Carabobo. This decision comes after an adverse analytical result was confirmed for César Sanabria of Team Venezuela País de Futuro, who had originally been declared the winner,” (link).
The Colombian cyclist Carlos Daniel Echeverri Cardona has been suspended for three years by the International Cycling Union (UCI) after he tested positive for the anabolic agent ligandrol. “Echeverri, 24, tested positive at the 2023 Pan American Games, specifically in a sample taken on October 24, the very day he won the silver medal in the team sprint,” (link).
The 43-year-old Italian cyclist Luigi Mastantuoni, who competes for Mastantuoni Sport 1950, has tested positive for EPO for the second time in his career. “In 2011, Mastantuoni had already been sanctioned for using Darbepoetin Alfa, another form of EPO, receiving a two-year suspension from the National Anti-Doping Tribunal,” (link). A 61-year Italian cyclist has also been provisionally suspended (link).
The 1997 Tour de France cyclist Jan Ullrich, who was caught doping throughout his career (link), commented on a recent ARD documentary which exposed the continuing use of AICAR in the peloton. “I was missing the facts, who did it, where the indicated subjects are. I was missing the evidence. It was presented in an interesting way, but I would have expected more details,” (link). You can find ARD’s investigation here; “Up to 14 people, some of whom are under serious suspicion, got off scot-free, most of them from cycling” (link).
A Blick columnist penned an article on the ‘100 year’ history of doping in cycling in anticipation of the upcoming Tour de France. “A lot has changed, and cycling has certainly become cleaner. But is it completely clean? When you see Tadej Pogacar flying up the mountains, you'll once again frown at his performances this year,” (link).
The Indian Athletics Federation is now forcing coaches in the country to officially register for coaching licenses to tackle the increasing doping problem in Indian athletics. If coaches engage in doping, but are unlicensed, they are unlikely to be sanctioned. “Alarmed by the rising doping cases among Indian track and field athletes, the AFI, in its AGM in Chandigarh in January, has made it compulsory for all coaches to register with it or else they would be blacklisted. In fact, the AFI had started the registration process last year but found that a large number of coaches are reluctant to register,” (link). Meanwhile, the Athletics Integrity Unit has provisionally suspended the middle distance runner Twinkle Chaudhary, from India, after she tested positive for methyltestosterone (link).
The winner of the Italian Maga Circe marathon Lhoussaine Oukhrid, who runs for the club Asd AT Running, has tested positive for EPO. “Doping is nothing new in Oukhrid's career, having already tested positive for EPO in 2018 following an Italian half-marathon championship, with a four-year ban ending in 2021. Now, if the positivity is confirmed, a lifetime ban will most likely be imposed,” (link). ValBrembana also reported on the story (link).
The Kenyan runner Morine Michira was provisionally suspended after testing positive for the stimulants higenamine and octodrine. “Her best performance is over the half-marathon distance. Last year, at the Milano Half Marathon, she finished in 1:08:13,” (link).
The Spanish Olympic 100m sprinter Jael Bestué believes that doping cases have been ‘covered up’ in the past. “A lot of cases are coming to light now. They didn't come to light as much before. In fact, I think there were some cases that didn't. People who cheat are coming to light. I don't know, I guess there are more and more new things, people are hiding...This is a world I'm a little unfamiliar with,” (link).
The American Olympic wrestler Aaron Brooks, who won a bronze medal at Paris 2024, has failed a drug test which his father says was due to the consumption of an over-the-counter supplement used to ‘promote optimal hormone levels’. “He finally gets out and is looking at his doctor's report and all the things he's lacking in. And he went to get supplements to replenish whatever it is that needs to be replenished. One of the things he purchased was right next to the fish oil. It's just a supplement, a natural, plant-based supplement, so he picked it up and started taking these things,” (link). Brooks has released a statement (link).
The World Champion boxer Jaime Mungia, who is coached by Canelo Alvarez’s trainer Eddy Reynoso, has ten days to provide an official explanation for his positive testosterone finding. “They also emphasized that neither Eddy Reynoso nor Canelo Álvarez's team have any involvement in Munguía's supplementation, which is managed by a third party,” (link).
The new UFC Heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall addressed the numerous doping scandals involving his recently retired rival Jon Jones. “If your job is to physically hurt someone in what could change the rest of their life...You're a complete piece of shit and you should never be able to fight again if you're doping. It's like using a gun in a knife fight. How can you look in the mirror when you know you're cheating? You could hurt someone for life. It's disgusting,” (link). You can watch the full segment on The Ariel Helwani Show here (link). Another MMA fighter, Demetrious Johnson, has made similar comments (link). You can read about Jon Jones’ past doping cases here (link).
The Youtuber-boxer Jake Paul addressed the persistent doping allegations that he has faced after defeating the Mexican boxer Julio Cesar Chavez Jr at the weekend. “They should focus on Canelo and his team, not Jake Paul. It’s crazy people who actually test positive don’t get called out, and I’m over here looking like a doughboy with love handles after not eating for three weeks. If I were on that stuff, it wouldn’t work,” (link).
The Senegalese wrestler Moustapha Senghor, known as Siteu, has been suspended for two years after refusing a drug test (link).
The Hamburg SV footballer Mario Vuskovic, who is the first footballer in the major European leagues to test positive for EPO, told the Hamburger Abendblatt that the police searched his belongings after his failed drug test. Vuskovic, who is banned for four years, still has a locker in the club’s locker room. “After the session, the police confiscated all my things. I stood in front of my locker in the locker room with five police officers. The rest of the team stayed in the anteroom and could watch everything through a glass door. Everyone could see my things being rummaged through. It was a shock, even for my teammates,” (link).
The Norwegian cross country skier Therese Yohaug, who was banned for eighteen months in 2017 (link), says the recent clenbuterol case involving the German Olympic champion Victoria Carl will be ‘boring’ and ‘sad’. “From the insight I have into the matter in the media, it seems completely similar with exactly the same setting. With an acute illness and a doctor who is supposed to fix it. It is clearly the athletes' responsibility,” (link). You can read in more detail about Carl’s case here (link). A pharmacologist (link) and an ARD journalist (link) both discussed the possible length of sanction the athlete faces.
The International Biathlon Union executive committee announced which athletes will be redistributed medals between 2010 and 2014 after the Swiss Federal Courts upheld a decision to strip the Russian biathlete Evgeny Ustyugov of his results over this period. “Among those who will receive medals is also Lukas Hofer , who goes from bronze to silver for the mass start at the 2011 World Championships in Khanty-Mansiysk,” (link). You can read the full decision in Ustyugov’s doping case here; the athlete was a part of Russia’s state-run doping programme at the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics (link).
The German canoeist Martin Hiller, a world champion, has accepted a penal order from the Potsdam Public Prosecutor after he was suspended for four years for doping. “According to the court, Hiller took prohibited performance-enhancing substances in Potsdam and Dubai between September 10 and 28, 2024 - the post-season holiday period in canoeing,” (link). In Germany, the identity of athletes suspended for doping are not publicly disclosed but Hiller’s case was uncovered by ARD (link).
The International Testing Agency suspended the Polish canoeist Remigusz Nowaczyk for three months after he tested positive for cocaine. “The sample of the athlete was collected on 17 September 2022 in Bydgoszcz (Poland) during an in-competition anti-doping control at the 2022 FISU World University Championship Canoe Sprint,” (link).
L'Equipe published a Long Read on doping in trail running, and participants’ reliance on over-the-counter pain medications to finish races. The article cites the past case of the French runner Didier Zago who tested positive for EPO. “In early 2024, another study, this time conducted during four of the 2017 UTMB week events, showed that 49.8% of the 412 individual urine samples collected and analysed during the race contained a medicinal substance and that 16.3% of them even contained one or more substances from the list of products prohibited by WADA,” (link).
Major League Baseball banned the Cuban pitcher Julio César Rodríguez, who plays for the Houston Astros’ feeder team, after he tested positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone. “Rodríguez signed with the San Francisco Giants in 2018 for a $300,000 bonus and briefly reached the Triple-A level with the Sacramento River Cats in 2023,” (link).
Bloomberg published an article on the Enhanced Games titled ‘The ‘Enhanced Games’ Is the Ultimate MAGA Athletic Competition’. “The first thing Peter Thiel said to Aron D’Souza — according to D’Souza — was, ‘I’m going to live forever.’ That was in 2009, a few years before D’Souza, an Australian lawyer, helped Thiel, a PayPal co-founder and one of Silicon Valley’s most influential men, bankrupt the gossip website Gawker via a lawsuit that hinged on a leaked sex tape of the wrestler Hulk Hogan,” (link). Der Spiegel also interviewed two scientists from the University of Birmingham who addressed whether the Enhanced Games doctors will administer doping substances themselves. “Apparently, there are conflicting statements internally. His deputy, Maximilian Martin, said at the launch event in Las Vegas that they themselves would not administer any substances. (link).
The former basketball player Dinos Mitoglou, who played for Italy’s most successful basketball club Olimpia Milano, was interviewed by Euro Insider about his 2022 doping case. Mitoglou tested positive for an anabolic steroid and was caught working with a Greek doping doctor; he was however cleared of intent to cheat (link). You can read more about the case here in an article I wrote on the abuse of clostebol in Italy; “The club was in the midst of its third anabolic steroid case in just three years, and it was the presence of a doping doctor in the background that increased the severity of the case” (link).
The Australian outlet A League Alerts reported on the recent story involving two American basketballers who tested positive for recreational drugs while playing in the Chinese Basketball League. “The Adelaide 36ers’ main attraction, Montrezl Harrell, has drawn unexpected off-season attention after his name surfaced in connection with a doping case during his time playing in Asia,” (link).
The World Anti-Doping Agency released a statement in response to claims made by the US Anti-Doping Agency CEO Travis Tygart, before a US Senate subcommittee, that WADA allowed the Chinese anti-doping agency to ‘cover up’ 23 doping cases before the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. “In fact, in 2020, Mr. Tygart himself testified before congress and, when referring to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), expressed serious concerns that foreign student athletes could come to the U.S. and have a “doping vacation” while participating in NCAA events,” (link).
The Fighter Health Podcast uploaded a new episode on how different doping substances effect the body’s hormonal system (link).
A scientific paper was published in Wiley titled ‘Comparison of laboratory results and pain perception in self-sampled capillary blood versus venous blood sampling: a systematic review and meta-analysis’ (link).
The World Air Sports Federation held a webinar on ‘Social Drugs and Air Sports: Make Sure You Fly Clean’ (link).
The Moldovan government adopted a draft law on the establishment of the ‘Council for Preventing and Combating Illicit Trafficking in Doping Substances’ (link).
The Spanish anti-doping agency and the Spanish Society of Sports Medicine signed a collaboration agreement to promote medical training for a more effective fight against doping (link).
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