Doping saga huge setback for Brooks

Brooks (above) was stunned, cried, refused to train ... her coach Marlon Malcolm said. The management of Sheri-Ann Brooks is confident the Jamaican sprinter will rebound from the devastation of missing last month's IAAF World Championships in Athletics (WCA), while battling a charge of banned substance use, to defend her Commonwealth Games 100 metres title next year.
According to close associates, Brooks was emotionally and physically drained by a sequence of events which began after she was notified she had tested positive for the stimulant methylhexanamine during Jamaica's trials. Although eventually cleared, she was not allowed her to compete at the WCA in Berlin, Germany, and eventually shut down the remainder of her 2009 season.
That decision did not spare Brooks damage to her reputation and loss of earning. However, according to her agent Kris Mychasiw, the "step back" should not prevent the sprinter from returning to the track early in 2010 for the indoor season and later in the year for the Commonwealth Games in India if she qualifies.
"There's no reason she should quit," Mychasiw said last Wednesday while dismissing speculation that the 26-year-old sprinter was pondering retirement from the sport. "She's going to go for (the Commonwealth Games gold) again."
Mychasiw said Brooks was invited to run at several post-WCA meets, including the lucrative mid-September IAAF/VTB Bank World Athletics Final, but the sprinter declined, choosing instead to re-group from the doping saga.
"She was crazy stressed," Mychasiw said.
"She told me that she was losing hair," the agent added. " ... She wasn't physically and mentally ready to race. She said, 'I think we should just call it a season'."
According to her coach, Jamaican Marlon Malcolm, the United States-based Brooks received a telephone call the day before a late July meet in Europe informing her of the positive test. The coach said Brooks, who through her agent declined to be interviewed for this story, was "stunned", cried, refused to train and wanted to withdraw from the meet.
"That was very hard for her," Malcolm said on Monday. " ... We couldn't practise ... We couldn't do anything, basically."
The toll lingered well beyond Brooks' return to Jamaica shortly after for a procession of disciplinary hearings and appeals which began on August 5.
"The damage was very high," said Malcolm. "Contracts gone down the drain. Money that could be made in the Worlds and also other meets also gone down the drain. Stopping her from running means wages lost and individuals are looking at her differently now."
Both Malcolm and Mychasiw insisted Brooks had been taking the same supplements for the past four years, which the agent claimed was checked by him to ensure they did not violate any International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) or World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) rules.
Methylhexanamine is not on WADA's banned list, which originally led to Brooks and four other athletes who tested positive for the stimulant at the trials being cleared of wrongdoing by the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission's (JADCO) Disciplinary Panel. However, JADCO, which took the urine samples at the trials, appealed the panel's decision, arguing that the stimulant had a similarchemical make-up to a substance banned by WADA.
But according to Malcolm, Brooks had been tested three times in Europe during the month and half immediately before Jamaica's trials, where on June 27 she finished third in the 100 metres, behind eventual WCA champion Shelly-Ann Fraser and silver medallist Kerron Stewart, to make Jamaica's team. The most recent test, he said, was done about two weeks before the meet at the National Stadium. Malcolm said Brooks was also tested in Europe in the weeks immediately following the trials. At no time, he explained, was she notified she had tested positive for any banned substance or that she was being investigated for banned substance use.
"None of them," the coach said.
The result from the test of her first or 'A' sample, Malcolm said, therefore came as a shock to the Brooks camp.
"I have no explanation," he said. "I strongly believe it was a mistake."
Brooks, as is her right, requested in writing that JADCO arrange to test a 'B' or second urine sample. Dr. Patrece Charles-Freeman, JADCO's executive director, said that letter asked for information about a "hearing", but did not state specifically that either Brooks or her representative needed to be present for the 'B' sample test, which is also the athlete's right under WADA code. The local agency authorised the Montreal, Canada-based testing laboratory to use another representative.
"If the athlete does not inform JADCO that they intend to be there, or that they intend to send a representative, then JADCO can request the lab assign a surrogate witness," Dr Charles-Freeman said on Tuesday.
Mychasiw, who said he is based in Montreal just minutes drive from the lab, insisted he was prepared to represent Brooks at the 'B' sample testing, but was not notified.
"Of course, I would have been there," he said.
Both Mychasiw and Malcolm claimed they first learned of the 'B' sample testing from JADCO's disciplinary hearing. The JADCO Appeals Tribunal cleared Brooks of the doping charge because neither she nor her representative was present at the testing.
"We were unable to impose a sanction on her, as there was an irregularity with the testing of the B sample that was raised by her counsel," Kent Gammon, JADCO's head of the disciplinary committee, explained in published statements. "Therefore, we were unable to conclude that she was guilty of an offence."
Meanwhile, Brooks's associates admitted that the doping saga was a huge setback for the athlete. Mychasiw said meet directors in Europe are willing to invite Brooks to compete. But Malcolm accused JADCO of "incompetence" and "ruining" Brooks's reputation.
"They ruptured their names on the circuit at the athletes' expense," he said.
But Dr Charles-Freeman brushed aside the coach's claims.
"I do not have to respond to Mr Malcolm," she said. " .. It think it is pointless."
Malcolm is also unhappy that the Jamaica Amateur Athletic Association (JAAA) did not allow Brooks to compete at the WCA.
"They should have allowed her to run the 100," the coach argued. " ... A lot of athletes compete at the Worlds who are under investigation."
Mychasiw conceded that Brooks' reputation won't easily be repaired on the circuit.
"It comes with a shadow," he said of the doping saga.
However, he believes Brooks is willing to close that chapter.
"She is angry at how things transpired, but she's not holding any grudges," Mychasiw said. "She's ready to move on."
But the agent is still waiting to receive official correspondence from JADCO indicating Brooks was cleared. The four other athletes, who also tested positive for the stimulant at the trials, have been officially banned by Jamaica, although their cases were heard after Brooks'. Mychasiw said he needs the documentation for his records.
"Just something simple, so we have it on file," the agent said. "One page, one
paragraph, is all we wanted."
It would, he added, put an official cap on Brooks's disastrous - and abrupt - 2009 season and possibly work as a launching pad for next year, which includes October's Commonwealth Games in India.
"It's been a long mountain to climb," said Mychasiw on behalf of his client, "but sometimes you have to take a step back to move forward."

Saturday September 26, 2009
Published: Sunday | September 27, 2009/Gordon Williams, Gleaner Writer

Caster Semenya, the poster victim

The South African runner is being used by those arguing gender is just cultural
You've got to pity Caster Semenya, the ambiguously sexed runner who won a women's world championship race last month - by quite a wide margin. The poor South African girl has been betrayed by her handlers and exploited by her own country. She has set off a huge debate about the uses and abuses of gender testing in elite sports. Her track career is probably over. On top of that, the entire world is curious about her genitalia. And now, she's become the poster victim for a bunch of folks who think that gender is just cultural, that our questions about Ms. Semenya are oppressive, sexist and racist, and that gender testing ought to be abolished.
"Results of the gender investigation aside, Caster Semenya's humanity has already been sacrificed to Western culture's desperate, frightened effort to maintain the fiction of binary, fixed gender," wrote Kai Wright at The Root.
"The salacious sports media and the puritanical zealots that run international track and field have joined forces to hit a new low," thundered Dave Zirin, sports editor of The Nation.
"To win, you need to start with an unfair advantage. Maybe Semenya has one, but I'm still not sure it matters," argued Craig McInnes in The Vancouver Sun.
Ms. Semenya is blameless in this matter. She was raised as a girl and identifies as a woman. At first, the villain was the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), which ordered her to be tested after she won. The tipoff might have been that she looks like a man. She has a man's musculature, flat chest and thicker facial features. She has a deep voice, too. I'm ashamed to admit that when I saw her picture, I too rushed to judgment. "That's a man," I thought.
The South African government was outraged. It accused the IAAF of being sexist and racist. The women's minister said questions about Ms. Semenya's gender showed the "extent of patriarchy" in the sports world. The sports minister threatened a "third world war" if she was banned from competition. One magazine dressed her in stilettos and put her on the cover to prove how womanly she was. She looked like a man in drag.
Unfortunately, Ms. Semenya had already been secretly tested - by her own handlers - and the team's own doctor had urged them to withdraw her from the race.
Australian newspapers report that Ms. Semenya is, in fact, intersex. She has no uterus or ovaries, but she does have undescended testicles. People born with such anomalies are not rare. But they're not common, either. They have disorders of sex development that used to be known as defects. They are now cited as proof that sex and gender are entirely fluid, largely socially constructed, and that biology and DNA mean nothing.
Some people argue that these things don't even matter in the world of elite sports. "When training and nutrition are equal, it is increasingly difficult to tell the difference between some of the best-trained male and female Olympic swimmers," Mr. Zirin gamely wrote. He suggested that the idea that "women are somehow weaker and slower than men" threatens to catapult women's sport back into the Dark Ages.
Of course that's ridiculous. No woman will ever beat Michael Phelps, or even the guy who came in last. Those pesky male hormones will always make men significantly faster, stronger and higher than women are, to say nothing of more interested in beer and football. They aren't just another individual genetic advantage, like Mr. Phelps's gigantic feet. They are the deep, fundamental dividing line between the sexes.
It may be impossible to find a way for Ms. Semenya (who's been atrociously mistreated by the medal-hungry South Africans) to compete at an elite level. Is that unfair? Maybe. But it's even more so to pretend that it would be an equal contest. Women athletes shouldn't have to compete against people with a male hormonal edge. The next time we worry about how to be fair, maybe we should ask them.

By Margaret Wente
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

Mothersill's husband in doping scandal

Trinidad & Tobago’s Olympian Ato Stephens, husband of Caymanian sprinter Cydonie Mothersill, has been banned for two years following a doping scandal, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) disclosed on Friday.
In a list posted on the IAAF website on Friday, Mr Stephens was among 11 athletes who names had been posted due to doping violations.
Stephens, who failed to get past the first round of the 400m at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, was born Ato Modibo.
Stephens’ absence from the track this year had brought about speculations in Trinidad & Tobago, as it was clear that he was not injured. However, according to a source close to the Trinidad & Tobago federation, “we knew about his positive test, but the IAAF had asked us not to say anything.”
Stephens also represented his country at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney and again in Athens four years later. He placed fourth at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia.
His personal best in the 100m in 10.83 a race held in Clemson, South Carolina, on 12 April 2003.
In the 200m he had a personal best of 20.84 during a race held in Lauderdale Lakes, Florida, 7 April 2007.
On 16 July last year, Stephens had 32.62 in 300m in Liege. In the 400m he ran a personal best of 46.0 in Blacksburg Virginia.
Other athletes announced in the two-year ban include Hamid Essine of Morocco, Alexander Bulanov of Russia, Oxana Grishina of Russia, Alexander Trembach of Israel, Hamilton Silva of Brazil and Corne Barnado of Republic of South Africa.
Published on Wednesday, September 23, 2009

By Mwangi Ngamate
Mwangi@caymannetnews.com

Valverde won’t sleep in Italy during worlds

Alejandro Valverde doesn’t want any surprises from the Italians and will not sleep in Italy during this week’s world championships as planned.
According to the Spanish daily AS, Valverde and possibly other members of the elite men’s road team will sleep in a hotel in Switzerland rather than with the rest of the Spanish national team at a hotel already reserved in Italy.
The Spanish national team booked a hotel in nearby Italy last fall, but Valverde is looking for a hotel and plans to sleep safely within Swiss borders during the 2009 road cycling world championships, AS reported.
The recently crowned Vuelta a España champion is banned for two years from racing in Italy by CONI for what they say is proof he was linked to the Operación Puerto blood doping ring and wants to avoid any possible conflict from the Italian authorities.
An appeal by Valverde’s legal team to the Court of Arbitration for Sport challenging the jurisdiction of the Italian federation to impose a disciplinary sanction on a Spanish rider is pending, with a decision expected sometime this fall.
Spanish cycling federation president Juan Carlos Castaña told AS that the UCI promised him that Valverde has the green light to compete in the worlds.
“We registered Alejandro and there was no problem,” Castaño said. “I met yesterday with (UCI president) Pat McQuaid and he assured me that until CAS rules on his case, they are not going to act against him.”
Valverde is one of the favorites for victory in Sunday’s elite men’s road race.
“I am banned from racing in Italy,” Valverde was quoted in AS. “But I can go there for vacation, or to a hotel, whenever I want.”

By VeloNews.com
Published: Sep. 23, 2009

Six suspects still in frame over Finnish Ski Association doping case

Former cross-country skiing head coach Vähäsöyrinki not heard because of health problems. The seemingly never-ending saga over allegations of widespread doping in Finnish cross-country skiing is now entering the consideration of charges phase.
Det Chief Insp. Pauli Huuskonen, who is in charge of the investigation, disclosed in the commercial Finnish television channelNelonen’s news programme Nelosen uutiset that six individuals are still being treated as suspects.
“The criminal offences in question are aggravated fraud and false disclosure”, said Huuskonen.
The suspects are the former cross-country skiing head coach Pekka Vähäsöyrinki, the then cross-country skiing boss Antti Leppävuori, the Finnish Ski Association's then managing directorEsa Klinga, former top skiers Marjo Matikainen-Kallström and Jari Räsänen, and the Association's managing director from 2001 until earlier this year Jari Piirainen. The National Bureau of Investigation (Finland’s central criminal police) has heard 27 people in connection with the case. Background information was given by athlete and medical witnesses. According to District Prosecutor Mikko Jaatinen, who has been assigned to the case, the consideration of charges will be completed in the spring, at the earliest. Of the six suspects, Pekka Vähäsöyrinki has not been heard because of his health problems. Vähäsöyrinki has been the principal of Vuokatti Sports Institute since 1998. He will retire from this post at the beginning of November. Even if Vähäsöyrinki is not heard at this stage, he will still remain among the suspects. According to Huuskonen, it was clear from the start that the case would advance to the consideration of charges phase after the completion of the preliminary investigation. This is because the investigation was prompted by the Office of the Prosecutor General to begin with.

Tidigare avstängd får hoppa i Globen

2004 fråntogs han OS-guldet i Aten efter dopningsmisstankar. I maj i år stängdes han av. Ändå tävlar Ludger Beerbaum i Stockholm Horse Show i november. – Han är en hedersman med stort H, säger organisationskommitténs ordförande Ulf Rosengren.
Tyske stjärnryttaren Ludger Beerbaum är visserligen en ikon inom hoppningen och har fyra OS-guld på meritlistan. Men guldet som skulle ha blivit det femte raka, i Aten 2004, förvandlades till brons efter att hästen Goldfever testats positivt för dopningsmedlet betametason. Som om inte det missade lagguldet vore nog hamnade Beerbaum dessutom i rejält blåsväder när tyska ridsportsförbundet i våras bestämde sig för att ta krafttag mot dopningen.
– Det som hände nere i Tyskland var ett virrvarr. Men han (Beerbaum) har ju aldrig blivit fälld för något och jag känner honom som en väldigt rekorderlig person, säger Ulf Rosengren.
På måndagen stod det klart att Ludger Beerbaum gästar Globen i Stockholm Horse Show. En kontroversiell inbjudan kan det tyckas, med tanke på tyskens bagage.
Efter dopningsmisstankarna 2004 – något som Beerbaum själv förklarade med att medlet ingått i en eksemlindrande salva – har Beerbaum vunnit både VM- och EM-medaljer. I maj stängdes han dock av sedan han i en tv-intervju halvt om halvt erkänt att han tidigare i karriären använt icke tillåtna medel.
”Förr var min inställning att det som inte upptäcks är tillåtet. Men det vi gjorde förekommer inte längre”, sade han då.
I EM i somras deltog han inte, men nu är 46-åringen tillbaka, och vann bland annat huvudtävlingen i tyska Donaueschingen i lördags.
– Han är en levande, och synnerligen aktiv, legend, säger Ulf Rosengren.
– Det som hände 2004 handlade om dålig kontroll från hans sida. Det var en stor händelse och ett stort straff, men jag tycker att hans förklaringar låter plausibla.
Vad svarar du de som finner det märkligt att han kommer till Stockholm?
– Dels är det som hände fem år sedan och fullständigt överspelat. Dels är han en väldigt högt ansedd person.

DN Publicerat 2009-09-21 18:34
Lisa Edwinsson
lisa.edwinsson@dn.se
Foto: Walter Bieri / AP

WADA Executive Committee Approves 2010 Prohibited List

Montreal, September 19, 2009 - The World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) Executive Committee approved today the List of Prohibited Substances and Methods for 2010. The new List will now be officialized and published on WADA's Web site by October 1, 2009It will take effect on January 1, 2010.
The Prohibited List is one of the cornerstones of the harmonized fight against doping. It specifies substances and methods prohibited in sport. Its implementation is mandatory for organizations that have adopted the World Anti-Doping Code.
"The annual revision of the List is an elaborate and dynamic process involving international scientific experts and the solicitation of input from stakeholders so that changes are founded on expanding anti-doping knowledge, evidence from the field, and constantly growing understanding of doping practices and trends," said WADA's President John Fahey. "This process is highly consultative and WADA's role is one of facilitation. I am satisfied that, once again, the 2010 List reflects the latest scientific advances."
The development of the List begins with the circulation of a draft to stakeholders for comment. Comments received are considered by WADA's List Committee, who then presents its conclusions to WADA's Health, Medical and Research Committee. The latter in turn submits its final recommendations to the Executive Committee, who discusses the recommendations and makes a final decision at its September meeting.
Change of Status for Salbutamol
The 2010 List offers a number of changes compared to the 2009 List. In particular, the status of salbutamol, a beta-2 agonist, will change. Salbutamol - a substance considered as specified and therefore more likely to result in a sanction of a warning to a two-year ban in case of anti-doping rule violations - will be permitted under 1,000 nanograms per millilitre. Under the 2010 List, its use by inhalation will no longer require a Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) but rather a simplified declaration of use. This measure will allow the handling of salbutamol by anti-doping organizations in a more cost-efficient way.
In addition, the 2010 List will no longer prohibit supplemental oxygen (hyperoxia). The status of platelet-derived preparations (e.g. Platelet Rich Plasma, "blood spinning") has also been clarified. These preparations will be prohibited when administered by intramuscular route. Other routes of administration will require a declaration of use in compliance with the International Standard for TUEs.
Pseudoephedrine Reintroduced
Another noteworthy amendment is the reintroduction of pseudoephedrine to the List as a specified stimulant - a category of substances that is more likely to result in a sanction of a warning to a two-year ban in case of anti-doping rule violations.
Until 2003, pseudoephedrine was prohibited in sport. Pseudoephedrine was subsequently included in WADA's Monitoring Program in 2004. The Monitoring Program includes substances that are not prohibited in sport but are monitored in order to detect patterns of misuse.
Results of the Monitoring Program over the past five years have shown a sustained increase in samples containing pseudoephedrine concentrations of more than 75 milligrams per millilitre. The Program indicated clear abuse of this substance with high concentrations in a number of sports and regions. In addition, available literature shows scientific evidence of the performance-enhancing effects of pseudoephedrine beyond certain doses.
Based on literature and results of controlled excretion studies funded by WADA, pseudoephedrine will therefore be reintroduced in the List starting on January 1, 2010, with a urinary threshold of 150 milligrams per millilitre. Given the wide availability of medicines containing pseudoephedrine, WADA's Scientific Committees and Executive Committee recommended that the reintroduction of pseudoephedrine be accompanied by information and education campaigns by WADA's stakeholders.
New Scientific Research Projects
As is traditionally the case at its September meeting, WADA's Executive Committee approved scientific research projects for funding.
"Scientific research is one of WADA's key priorities," said John Fahey. "Our Research Grant Program allows us to enhance current detection means and to fund reactive research to ensure that quick response is made to new substances or methods that are being used by cheaters. It also contributes to anticipating doping trends and developing detection means before new doping substances or methods are made available to athletes. Our growing cooperation with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, as well as drug agencies and evaluation bodies, is a good example of how we strive to stay ahead of drug cheats."
A record number of research proposals (88) were received this year from 22 countries, with 34 being selected for funding by WADA's Scientific Committees and Executive Committee. These projects will help advance anti-doping research in such areas as the detection of blood manipulations, the development of new technologies of detection and the implementation of further means for detecting a number of substances and methods currently abused by athletes or potentially interesting to cheaters. Project descriptions will be posted on WADA's Web site once the contracts have been signed.
Book on Ethical Issues
The Executive Committee approved a special book project to be commissioned by WADA as part of the Agency's tenth anniversary. This book - to be written by Dr Thomas Murray, President of the Hastings Center in Garrison, United States - will address the ethical issues surround doping and doping-free sport. It will seek to advance knowledge in the field of social science and to provide an alternative vision of the future of sport based on ethical reasoning and an appreciation of the forces that shape elite sport.
WADA Tenth Anniversary
The next meetings of WADA's Executive Committee and Foundation Board will be held on December 1-2, 2009, in Stockholm, Sweden. These meetings will be an opportunity for the Agency, which was founded on November 10, 1999, to mark its tenth anniversary.