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The Grey Area doping thread

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Re: Re:

Merckx index said:
samhocking said:
The only grey area in anti-doping is within the WADA rules allowing prohibited substances to be used and within S0 class because substances in S0 are not necessarily detectable.

This point is interesting, because NFL player Julian Edelman just got sanctioned, and his defense is that the NFL doesn't even know what the substance he was caught with is. They can't identify it. What they presumably can do, though, is claim it's non-approved.

Don't want to sidetrack the, ahem, discussion about tramadol, but thought this ought to be pointed out.

Are the NFL signatories to the WADA code? It’s be good to get back to a relevant discussion. Any info on the case?
 
Re:

samhocking said:
Do I take that Tramadol isn't a grey doping area then compared to say faking an ankle injury for TUE Corticosteroids otherwise banned or using a banned substance in S0 you know WADA do not know about and can't detect so you are legally protected just like the TUE protects you legally?
Ok seriously, STOP! S0 does not cover faking a TUE. It covers drugs in development or drugs not otherwise approved by government agencies for human use. You quoted it, we can all see that's what it says, stop pretending it says something else.
 
Boonen, you have to view it in terms of the lab. The lab identifies classes of substances within each method of blood/urine analysis. Now, they can find e.g. Corticosteroids in two samples. The sample with a TUE is legally free. The sample without the TUE faces an AAF. Two riders with equal evidence of Corticosteroids sees a grey area one walks free due to the rules surrounding TUEs exempting them regardless of ethics.

The lab looking for S0 substances is the same thing. The lab is looking for classes of substances using each method of analysis. They might not find the substance because they can't detect it. The reason the athlete is using an S0 substance is because they know they can't possibly face an AAF for something nobody in WADA knows about or the lab can't detect or is looking for, just like the holder of the TUE will know his AAF won't occur either. They are both exempt in the grey area from an otherwise probable ADRV result despite both using what is essentially a prohibited substance in class S0 to S5 or even up to S7. That is the grey doping area. Tramadol is actually very black and white.
 
Re:

samhocking said:
Boonen, you have to view it in terms of the lab. The lab identifies classes of substances within each method of blood/urine analysis. Now, they can find e.g. Corticosteroids in two samples. The sample with a TUE is legally free. The sample without the TUE faces an AAF. Two riders with equal evidence of Corticosteroids sees a grey area one walks free due to the rules surround TUEs.,
No, the one taken OOC is not an AAF. The one with a TUE is an AAF but not an ADRV. This is AD101.
samhocking said:
The lab looking for S0 substances is the same thing. The lab is looking for classes of substances using each method of analysis. They might not find the substance because they can't detect it. The reason the athlete is using an S0 substance is because they know they can't possible face an AAF for sometihng nobody in WADA knows about or the lab can't detect or is looking for just like the holder of the TUE can't either. They are both exempt from a possible ADRV despite using what is essentially a prohibited substance in class S0 to S5 or even S7. That is the grey area. Tramadol is actually very black and white.
There is more to AD than lab work.
 
I see anti-doping grey area as a legal matter fmk. You see it as an ethical matter. Difference of opinion, but ethics don't exist at the moment in anti-doping. Tramadol is legal so to me not a grey area unlike otherwise illegal Corticosteroids under false TUE which can be.
 
Re:

samhocking said:
I see anti-doping grey area as a legal matter fmk. You see it as an ethical matter. Difference of opinion, but ethics don't exist at the moment in anti-doping. Tramadol is legal so to me not a grey area unlike otherwise illegal Corticosteroids under false TUE which can be.
Don't try and dismiss this as 'just' an ethical debate. You know full well that the law is not black and white and many issues are open to interpretation, ie in the grey area.
 
Re:

macbindle said:
Is grey area (non)doping really worth shouting about?
If it is grey area then it is still within rules.
Tramadol. In discussing it its WADA-reported use has declined by a third between 2013 and 2017 and it is now being banned by the UCI on health grounds. So, yeah, it kinda is worth discussing.

Further, grey is not necessarily within the rules. It is within an interpretation of the rules.
 
Re: Re:

fmk_RoI said:
macbindle said:
Is grey area (non)doping really worth shouting about?
If it is grey area then it is still within rules.
Tramadol. In discussing it its WADA-reported use has declined by a third between 2013 and 2017 and it is now being banned by the UCI on health grounds. So, yeah, it kinda is worth discussing.

Further, grey is not necessarily within the rules. It is within an interpretation of the rules.

Now you're getting there. The grey area is about interpretation of the rules or what the rules allow. No interpretation is required to use Tramadol and no rules apply to it, therefore it doesn't exist within the grey area, other than ethically, which is simply an opinion of the rider and team to legally use it or not.
 
Re: Re:

samhocking said:
No interpretation is required to use Tramadol and no rules apply to it, therefore it doesn't exist within the grey area, other than ethically, which is simply an opinion of the rider and team to legally use it or not.
No interpretation of the rules may be needed to use it but even WADA have given it a grey status by putting it on its monitoring list.

Quite clearly, given the manner in which you have wilfully misrepresented the truth today (S0), ethical issues are alien to you and so you dismiss them out of hand. But often with AD the ethical dimension needs to be ventilated in order to 'fix' the legal status of something. Look at Sandro Donati's challenge to the status of blood transfusions in 1984. That, along with other issues, has impacted how we feel about the gold medals won by the Americans in LA (they are tainted), along with Moser's Hour. Legally, no one is challenging their status but the 'grey' status of tranfusions pre-85 matters to most people's interpretation of the 'value' of those sporting achievements. Because sport is not just about winning. It is subjective as well as objective.

The ethcal dimension also matters when you consider those who have represented themselves as more ethical than others. But you of all people do not need to be told that
 
Caffeine & nicotine are on the monitored list are they grey areas too? Where do you begin and end if not simply use the rules and prohibited list to decide? Arguably, if you wanted to remove the grey area to it's logical conclusion, everything medical from a bandage to a legal TUE for Corticosteroids is effectively performance enhancing as is taking vitamins, supplements, health checks, x-rays. Every decision an athlete and team makes is based on "Will it make me go faster, harder and longer" If it does, they then ask "Is it legal", if it is they then ask themselves should I take it and only then will the ethical decision be asked, is it right? Just like what people eat, some will not think it right to eat meat, some will not think its right to eat meat or dairy, some won't even eat anything that doesn't naturally fall to the ground. Nobody is right or wrong.
 
Re: Re:

fmk_RoI said:
thehog said:
An informative thread
Actually, it's mostly been a load of old shite, that's had to be refuted.

Disagree. Just because it doesn’t interest you does mean it’s “old shite”. Judging by your contributions I’d say you don’t actually think this way, you’re just baiting which got you banned not so long ago. It’s tather boring to be honest but not unexpected, don’t blame me when banned again.
 
Re:

Ripper said:
My sense is medicines are being used for big time weight loss, power modulation, and big time recovery. Modern medicine is your friend. Ross Tucker made a pretty interesting 4 minute rant on how the pushing of physical capacities and tolerances was physiologically similar to the same stress as a disease or illness state (link below). So medications that are legal can still make a significant difference. And the fun thing is, while there is a 'normal' response to medications, there is still a great deal of individual variability that can only be understood by experimentation. One drug that helps me lose weight results in another person gaining weight. and of course, the more a medication 'ticks all the boxes', the more likely it is the drug of choice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XblhV0yxzOM

Yes saw that, that was very good. I do like his stuff, he is sensible voice amongst the noise of ‘working harder’.
 
That's an interesting point.
However, there is some growing feeling within sports medicine, especially surrounding asthma and respiratory treatment that athletes cannot control illnesses like the normal man on the street can and so are forced to explore grey areas. If we look at Salbutomol for instance, a sufferer on the street would keep asthma under control using prevention steroids, therefore reducing the need to take Salbutomol to absolute minimum. For an athlete, they can't control it using those normal steroids as illegal. Even if not illegal, it is now unethical to use a TUE to take them and so basically their asthma or chest condition is medically not under control whatsoever.
This then has knock-on effects. As we know from Froome, in the last week of La Vuelta he had a chest infection and little discussed, is he was also taking antibiotics to keep the infection under control. It was this infection that Froome's doctor says is the reason his Salbutomol dose was increased above what he normally prescribes. Ironically, steroids under TUE would have removed the need to up his Salbutomol and of course the chest infection probably would never have occurred either to need antibiotics. Obviously i'm believing the narrative from Sky here, but it's simply to discuss the point as others within sports medicine have made this point not Sky.

So all round, knock-on effects. Froome used to control chest conditions with a TUE, now we know he doesn't for what he claims is ethical reasons / the grey area. The consequence, perhaps, he is now reliant on less than ideal medical treatment, despite within an environment, probably requiring more of medicine than than the man on the street.

What I'm, getting at beneath all of this, is team doctors are now looking into the legal medicines within the grey area outside the stigma of a TUE is now seen as an excuse for a PED and so simply dealing with medical conditions that simply do not become an issue for Joe public who do not have to live their lives within WADA rules 24/7.
 

Spenser777

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