Have WTC stated that?

From Beth Gerdes

the WTC (World Triathlon Corporation) has agreed that based on the evidence presented, my ingestion of ostarine was unintentional

From the WTC

Quote

Ms.Gerdes was not able to establish how the ostarine entered her body and, therefore, IRONMAN proceeded in accordance with the Rules and had no basis to reduce the period of ineligibility.”

I think my two statements make sense because I didn't say she did it on purpose.

I'm not saying these women took the substance on purpose, but where do you draw the line on what is an acceptable excuse? So if I get popped for Winstrol, as long as i crush some up and put it in my salt tabs, im good?
What if the amounts in their system were small only because they stopped the larger doses a month before the test?? Im NOT saying that is the case, more just an example of what could happen... If WADA changes their rules to say you wont be guilty if your supplements contained the banned substance, that will cause a lot of issues!!
Anyway, assuming it was in fact unintentional, then i certainly wish for the best for these two athletes.

Exactly ... any professional taking an over the counter supplement is either an idiot or never read a thing on doping in sports. It's pretty well known by every competitive person I know that over the counter supplements can and generally are contaminated ... even the ones you don't think are.

OTC supplements are not regulated by the FDA and in some cases, the companies actually put banned substances in them without labeling them (though, they would never actually say they do) to get better results for their users and sell more product.

This is why "ALL" pro athletes or those that may be subjected to testing are warned not to take any OTC supplements, even multi-vitamins many times. You just don't know what's in them.

This of course makes for a great excuse when caught cheating though ... I didn't know it was in there is a great way to say you're not cheating, when you really are. It's been used many, many times by pro's.

So i shouldnt mail order me some spanish steak?? ;)

Found this interesting tidbit on the interwebs:

https://www.naturalproductsinsider.com/...mining-drug-ost.aspx

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Taco cat spelled backwards is....taco cat.

I have no doubt that the athletes didn't know they were taking tainted substances but I seriously doubt the substance became 'incident contaminated' of 'cross contaminated' due to poor manufacturing practices. I think this distinction is really important for athletes to understand when it comes to the risk of taking supplements.

As an analytic chemist with some experience studying bioactive compounds I am VERY skeptical about banned substances ending up in products at concentrations which trigger a fail test. Every drug testing protocol has its own built in error limits such that it takes a pretty preposterous chain of events to transfer enough of a substance like ostarine into a salt tablet for an athlete to then test positive. It is far more likely these PEDs are intentionally put into products by the manufacturers or suppliers (in secret so consumers are none the wiser) so that the products have a clear performance enhancing edge. I will try and dig out an article from a few years ago which reported just how rampant this issue was with producers adding steroids to creatine powder. The issue wasn't just a matter of a rouge company but of the labs which produce products (then sold by many companies) trying to increase the total market usage by creating products with clear performance enhancing business.

In summary I think there needs to more recognition that their is a nefarious side to sports supplement production and athletes are pawns in the game rather than victims of an unfortunate accident. This doesn't make the athletes who were caught deserve their punishment, and as a whole I think the community needs to push back against the industry.

Agree, but how to regulate that fairly. Again, athletes could easily 'spike' their own supplements, etc. And in cases of genuine fault of the manufacturer, will it make the other athletes that maybe missed out on podium and prize money because they were beat by someone that had pharmaceutical assistance, feel better? Maybe, i dunno..

Sadly it's more common than you would think for non tested supplement to be contaminated. Usually the supplement manufactur is 3rd partly manufactured in a facility the may be making a whole host of things.

Theach company selling the product doing want to pay the extra for third party testing, so you have a recipe for cross contamination.

The companies that do third party test their products are more likely to take more care in their manufacturing process.

The smart athlete only use a supplement that has a traceable manufacture and batch testing process. Also they only take them when it is absolutely necessary to minimise risk.

This doesn't just affect Pro athletes. Can you trace the manufacture of the supplements that you use? This includes gels, energy powaders, protein powders etc etc.

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http://www.tri-monkey.co.uk

She will serve a six-month suspension for testing positive for the same substance, Ostarine. The suspension was retroactively enacted from the positive test date and expires tomorrow.

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At least they're coming down hard on the athletes. Seriously though, if that's the type of punishment, what's the point?

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

And I suppose every duffle bag (d-bag for short) that has no independent thought and jumps at the opportunity to put down someone who is a superior athlete to them because it makes them think they are better than them would say. I'm not saying that describes you but if we're lumping everyone together based on what the guilty say, you look like a real d-bag.

I don't even have a sense how expensive or feasible this would be to test everything before you take it. You can't even just test the product, you would have to test each tablet, packet, gel, etc. since a specific lot could be contaminated. Is a home test for all banned substances available, affordable, and could return results fast enough to take what you just tested before it goes bad since it could be perishable?

"do you know what the difference in manufacturing is that makes something like a salt tablet risky, but "normal food" non-risky?"

no. and i've asked jonathan toker to recast his old 2008 article in the context of the news of yesterday. i would just say that a company making bread is not likely to also be making supplements. i think those are discrete and different operations.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

All information I have found has shown this not to be true at all. It is only manufactured legally by a pharmaceutical company using it in clinical trials. It is illegal for anyone else to use for any reason. There was this link someone posted above and the one from the FDA that I posted earlier.

People do seem to be making and selling it illegally - either openly on the internet and also purposely in supplements, unlabeled.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

But the company that made the vitamin C supplement that was added to the bread? They probably make all sorts of stuff.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

Wouldn't outing the supplement company hold them accountable at least a little bit? PR pressure which in turn would force them to hold their manufacturers to higher standards. Being able to remain nameless won't help drive better accountability.

I cant remember if it is wada, itu, etc but at least one of them keeps a list posted online of supplements known to have contained banned substances.

"It is far more likely these PEDs are intentionally put into products by the manufacturers or suppliers (in secret so consumers are none the wiser) so that the products have a clear performance enhancing edge."

you bring up a good point and jonathan toker and i had this discussion last night. let's say that one of his products contained a trace amount of ostarine (his product, btw, was not implicated in the present case based on my reporting). then you dump this into the "lake" which is the human body, making this trace amount the next thing to undetectable. so, how can uncleaned equipment be the culprit?

however, what YOU are saying is that companies intentionally spike their salt tabs (or whatever) with a drug that makes you perform or recover very well, so you keep buying more of it. okay. but then when these athletes get popped and the supplements are tested, one by one, you'd certainly find the supplement with more than a trace of ostarine. more like a scoopful (or whatever the necessary amount is).

where are the supplements with scoopfuls?

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Thanks for chiming in on this. The whole notion of "accidental" cross-contamination never made sense to me.

This what you were thinking of?

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/...All=false&page=6

No, it was a list posted on one of the sport governing anti doping sites. Might have been the Canadian one. That said, it might have been the same list of products that your link has, not sure

This loops back around to what some people have already said; that using "supplements" is flirting with disaster. And lets face it, most people that are using supplements are looking for performance benefits/advantages over their competition. Legally, yes, but still, that is the whole point of putting these supplements in to your body. Hopefully everything in them is above board and maybe you eke out a 0.5% performance gain, but you must acknowledge the risk that a supplement contains undisclosed stuff that could result in a positive test. Safer to avoid supplements altogether.

What to do? Food. Balanced diet. I do use gels (Powerbar gels are my favorite) and sports drink (Infinit, UCan and Gatorade). Fairly reputable companies that I have to trust are keeping everything on the up and up. If I ever test positive for something (and I dream of being fast enough to be worth testing), I'll at least know where to start looking.

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Jason
None of the secrets of success will work unless you do.

supplement411.org

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

But knowing where to start looking (Lou had few enough she was able to track it down to the salt tabs) doesn't do anything. Salt tabs are pretty common and not any different in my eyes than the gels and sports drinks. Just a tough situation all around.

Now, lets not be honest that so many are trying to walk the fine line for a competitive "legal" edge

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

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