According to the World Anti-Doping Agency, steroid is one of the commonly abused drug in the world of sports, since steroid can enhance the level of testosterone in the body. Recent researches however were published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, showing that current steroid doping tests performed on international athletes are actually inaccurate.

Through gas chromatography, standard result was set at a threshold above four for everyone. This chemical analysis would show in the testosterone: epitestosterone ratio through urine samples. The gene directly affected during the test (UGT2B17 gene) also affects the rate of metabolism in the body. Since it affects metabolism, it can also affect the testosterone levels found in the urine.

From EurekAlert! Public News:

“Previous research has indicated that variations in this gene account for some of the differences in the urinary T:E ratio between men of white and Asian ethnic backgrounds. The gene affects metabolism, and therefore the rate at which testosterone is passed out of the body into the urine.

They included 57 men of Black African origin; 32 of Asian origin; 32 of Hispanic origin; and 50 of white (Caucasian) origin in their research. All the men were aged between 18 and 36.

The results revealed the genetic variation in almost one in four (22%) of the African footballers; in eight out 10 (81%) of the Asian players; one in 10 of the white men, and in 7% of the Hispanic players.

Based on these findings, the Swiss researchers “recalibrated” the thresholds for each ethnic group.

The new T:E ratios were: 5.6 for men of African origin; 5.7 for white men, and 5.8 for men of Hispanic origin. For men of Asian origin, the ratio was 3.8.”

This research concluded that a single threshold result is not deemed fit to be used for international sports. Doping tests and threshold standards should be specific for each ethnic group due to genetic variations. Furthermore, it just shows that many factors may also indirectly affect an athlete’s steroid profile.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: doping test, ethnicity, sports medicine, testosterone

Posted in Steroid Cycles, Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, buy steroids, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

Swiss studies with approval from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) have brought to light the fact that ethnic variations might cause testosterone doping tests in sport to be unsuitable. While some might raise questions over this, studies do reveal significant differences in testosterone levels in athletes from different geographical origins.

Examined at Lausanne, Switzerland, the results indeed reveal a unique but non specific basis to evidence the misuse of steroid testosterone is not appropriate for the purpose. The tests were performed on athletes from four major geographic origins which primarily included Hispanics, Caucasians, Africans and Asians.

From thaindian.com:

The current doping test in sport for the steroid testosterone is not suitable because of ethnic variations, a Swiss study has revealed.

The study was commissioned by FIFA and carried out among 171 players around the world. The study revealed “significant differences” in the so-called testosterone-epitestosterone ratio with which the use of synthetic testosterone is to be detected.

The official WADA benchmark of 4:1 was surpassed by Hispanics (5.8:1), Caucasians (5.7:1) and Africans (5.6:1) while Asians registered 3.8:1 in the tests after steroids were added to their urine samples.

Furthermore, as an alternative, it suggested that a biological passport could prove to be a better replacement for the current test methods for cases with suspicious levels of natural testosterone. However, it was also argued that different people release different levels of testosterone and so the studies would need stronger grounds to prove its findings.

Where the introduction of biological report was not entirely negated, Wilfred Schaenzer, the head of the doping lab in Cologne, Germany stated that the isotope test can still determine that the synthetic testosterone was added or not.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: doping, doping test, steroids, testosterone, testosterone tests

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Olympics, Steroids in Sports, buy steroids, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

Giving a new spark to WADA’s new code, football could face Olympic axe if its chief bodies, FIFA and its European counterpart UEFA, do not meet the terms of the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (Wada) “whereabouts” code.

WADA wants the sport to join athletics against steroid abuse fight by providing players’ location for one hour each day of the year for doping test procedures. However, FIFA and UEFA said that they wanted to respect players’ privacy and did not accept that controls be undertaken during the short holiday period of players.

Wada general secretary David Howman said, “The sport could be removed from the Olympics.” He also added, “There is a clause in the IOC (International Olympic Committee) charter that states this - it falls in the IOC jurisdiction and not ours.”

In a teamwork effort to fight against doping, FIFA and Uefa asked Wada to reconsider its position on the ‘whereabouts’ rule. The governing bodies wanted to point out the fundamental differences between an individual athlete, who trains on his own, and a team sport’s athlete, who is present at the stadium six days out of seven, and thus easy to locate. Because of that, FIFA and UEFA wanted to replace the individual ‘whereabouts’ rule by collective location rules.

From BBC:

Football’s place in the Olympics could be under threat if its chief bodies do not comply with the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (Wada) “whereabouts” code.

Wada wants football to join sports like athletics and provide players’ location for one hour each day of the year.

World football body, Fifa, and its European counterpart, Uefa, said they wanted to respect players’ privacy.

“The sport could be removed from the Olympics,” Wada general secretary David Howman told BBC 5 Live.

He added: “There is a clause in the IOC (International Olympic Committee) charter that states this - it falls in the IOC jurisdiction and not ours.”

President of Wada, John Fahey responded, “One of the key principles of efficient doping control is the surprise effect and the possibility to test an athlete without advance notice on a 365-day basis. Alleging that testing should only take place at training grounds and not during holiday periods, it ignores the reality of doping in sport.”

However, Fifa president Sepp Blatter, who sits on Wada’s board, said that football’s world governing body had teamed up with other team sports, such as basketball, ice hockey and rugby union, to oppose the rules. “We are a little bit surprised that through certain declarations [Wada] say there will be no exceptions made,” he said.

The Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA) had already signalled their opposition to the WADA’s new code of doping.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: doping test, FIFA, International Olympic Committee, steroid abuse, Uefa, WADA

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Olympics, Steroids in Sports, buy steroids, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

British printer Christine Ijeoma Ohuruogu should have been touted as heroine back in her homeland, but that is not the case. Her triumphs in the track are overshadowed by her three – yes, not one but three – missed doping tests.

Her missed doping tests calls for the question: Did she win the Olympic gold through legitimate means?

Ohuruogu, who specializes in the 400 meters, is currently the most successful and probably the most notorious track athlete in Great Britain today. She currently holds the Commonwealth, World and Olympic titles in said event. That’s some accomplishment for a girl of 24 years, yet the Britons are having second thoughts of raining praises on Ohuruogu. Many ask: Does she deserve to be the poster girl for the 2012 Summer Games London.

Based on the accounts of several newspapers in her homeland the answer to that big Q could be a big NO. One British newspaper has the headline “New golden girl Christine Ohuruogu will be forever tarnished”, which sort of sums up the public’s image of the track champ.

Ohuruogu beat the favorite Sanya Richards of the USA with her time of 49.62 making the Nigerian-born Ohuruogo as the first British woman to top the event and only the fourth to earn a gold medal on the track. But, still there are the three missed doping tests.  The Times provides details of those missed tests.

Ohuruogu missed three random drug tests between October 2005 and July 2006. Athletes have to say where they will be for an hour every day for five days a week; a UK Sport tester can then turn up at the allotted place unannounced.

After the third missed test, Ohuruogu received a one-year ban from the International Association of Athletics Federations, athletics’ governing body, and had her British Sport Lottery funding stopped. She took her case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, but it upheld the ban while stating that there had been “no suggestion that she is guilty of taking drugs” and that “this case can be viewed in all the circumstances as a busy young athlete being forgetful”.

Ohuruogu was also banned for life from the Olympics because of a British Olympic Association bylaw barring anyone with a doping conviction from representing Britain. Ohuruogu completed her one-year exile only three weeks before the World Championships in Japan last year, where she made a remarkable comeback by winning the 400 metres. She then overturned her BOA ban on appeal. The independent Sports Dispute Resolutions Panel agreed that there had been significant mitigating circumstances.

Her reason for missing the second test was that she was at home finishing an article for a charity newspaper when she should have been at Northwick Park, North London. Ohuruogo said she spoke to the tester, who told her she was allowed to wait for only an hour, when it would have taken the athlete 90 minutes to make the trip.

The final straw came when she was not at the Mile End stadium when a tester turned up. “We went to train at Mile End but there was a school sports day so we made a last-minute change and went to Crystal Palace,” she said.

The article continues that it remains to be seen whether Ohuruogu will be honored the way past female track champions were recognized – Ann Packer is an MBE, Sally Gunnell an OBE and Kelly Homes is a Dame.

If you asked us, we think she deserves some kind of recognition from the British Empire. If Elton John was knighted by singing “candle in the wind” then, certainly, Ohuruogu merits a “Dame” before her name.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: 400m-event, Beijing Olympics, Christine Ohuruogu, doping test, Great Britain, missed doping tests

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Olympics, Steroids in Sports, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

Not many would do what coach Dimitar Vassilev did when he took responsibility for the positive doping test of his middle distance runner Daniela Yordanova.  In the doping world, where fingerpointing seems to be the trend, this is a rare act.

Yordanova tested positive for testosterone on June 13, 2008. She was considered to be one of her country’s best bets to earn medals in the athletics in the ongoing Beijing Olympics. She placed third and fifth in the 2006 European Championships and in 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens respectively. The Sofia Echo provides details on this news.

Dimitar Vassilev, the coach of Bulgarian runner Daniela Yordanova, took the blame for the positive doping test that will prevent her from participating in the Beijing Olympics, the Associated Press reported on August 18.

“I take the full responsibility for Daniela Yordanova’s positive doping test,” Vasilev was quoted as saying. He said that diet supplements were most likely the cause: “Last spring, I incidentally bought some medicines from Greece and Turkey and most probably they contained some contaminated supplements.”

Yordanova, fifth in the 1500m race at the Athens Olympics, was seen as one of Bulgaria’s best bets for an athletics medal in Beijing. Test samples taken on June 13, however, came back positive for testosterone and she did not even fly out for China.

“We have to take a decision on Yordanova within two months. The expected sanction is a two-year competition ban,” Bulgarian athletics federation president Dobromir Karamarinov said, as quoted by the AP.

“Daniela was part of the world’s elite in the last eight years. She’s been tested constantly and all her samples so far were negative,” Reuters quoted him as saying. “I feel sorry that it’s happening with an athlete who is a model for giving everything possible during training and competitions.”

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: , Bulgarian, Daniela Yordanova, Dimitar Vassilev, doping test, positive test for doping, steroid, testosterone

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Olympics, Steroids in Sports, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

On July 5, Italian road racer Marta Bastianelli has tested positive for a banned compound which has made her ineligible to participate in the Beijing Olympics. Now, triathlete Lisa Huetthaler is expected to traverse the same track, losing her chance to compete for the Summer Games.

Huetthaler has been way past the naughty stage these past few months that we believe she took Meat Loaf’s song “Good girls go to heaven, but bad girls go everywhere” by heart. Too bad for Huetthaler the 60-year old singer is nowhere to be found on the music charts and elsewhere so Meat could not offer any advice to the beleaguered triathlete.

It has been reported that Huetthaler has tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug erythropoietin commonly known as EPO on her A-sample. To ensure that the B-sample test arrived negative, Huetthaler geared on a bribing mood.

The International Herald Tribune reports:

An Austrian triathlete is being investigated for attempting bribe a laboratory employee to pass a doping test, local media reported Wednesday.

The Kurier newspaper reported that Lisa Huetthaler, 24, offered an employee in the Seibersdorf laboratory €20,000 ($31,150) on May 21 to guarantee that her “B” sample didn’t return with the same result as her initial positive for EPO.

Erich Habitzl, spokesman for the public prosecutor’s office in the city of Wiener Neustadt, was cited by the Austria Press Agency as saying that an investigation was under way.
Huetthaler’s lawyer maintains his client’s innocence.

Earlier this month, Austria’s parliament passed a toughened anti-doping law.

Austria increased its efforts to eradicate doping after the 2006 Turin Olympics scandal,
when Italian police raided the Austrian cross-country and biathlon team lodgings, seizing a large amount of doping products and equipment.

Huetthaler positive A sample took place in May. Now, two months later, Fräulein Huetthaler ist in großer Schwierigkeit. Translation: Miss Huetthaler is in big trouble. As in waist-deep trouble since bribery constitutes a criminal act.

From Earthtimes:

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) confirmed the report by the Austrian Kurier newspaper that it had been informed of the incident in June by the Austrian government. “The laboratory informed us and the head of the laboratory confirmed the bribery attempt to us,” the Kurier cited the letter as saying. “This appears to be a criminal act.” A spokesperson for the Austrian prosecutor’s office confirmed that the incident was being investigated while WADA confirmed to Deutsche Presse-Agentur

In testing for PEDs like EPO and steroids WADA and similar organizations do not determine guilt until a positive A sample has been confirmed by a positive B sample. If the B-sample test confirms the A result, it is only then that a doping violation is declared.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Tags: bribery, doping test, EPO, Lisa Huetthaler, Martha Bastinelli, steroids, triathlete, WADA

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Sports, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions