In the World of Anti-Doping: a translated Interview from Switzerland

From the Swiss TSR TV network and the Swiss TeleTEXT service comes an interview with Martial SAUGY, director of the Swiss Anti – doping Laboratory in Lausanne. This interview is available to over a million (or two if counting the Pays de Gex (Ain) and Haute Savoie French départements) television viewers. For those following these subjects, Monsieur Saugy was the individual last autumn who told the press that, under his agency's analysis, some 47 samples from the 2007 Tour de France showed signs of EPO use.

That was a shocking story to read, after the massive revelations already stemming from last year's TdF, 'les affaires' that implicated Rasmussen, Vinokourov, Mayo and others. Moreover, it was a story that seems to have disappeared from view, ever since that first initial declaration.

WADAwatch translates this interview as a linguistic public service, to provide information to English readers that would not otherwise have access.

In our humble opinion, this
translated interview falls legally within
the 'education' exception to copyright law.

A link has been provided to the source web site.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

CYCLING: a Tour based on spring–water?

The Tour de France celebrates a sad anniversary this year. It was just ten years ago that the 'Affaire Festina' exploded, a verifiable revelation on the organized and generalized doping in bicycle racing.

Since then, the will to eradicate the flood has been repeated often by all the directing agents of cycling. Alas, the 'Tour of Renewal' announced in loud voices at each and every July debut has not brought but disillusions and scandals to this point.

Will this be otherwise this year, on the routes of the Tour? Martial Saugy, director of the Laboratoire suisse d'Analyse du Dopage, responds to the interrogations of an ever more sceptical public.

TXT: For some ten years and since the Festina affair, one speaks each year of the 'Tour of Renewal'. And at each occasion, the disillusion is total. Do you think that this will be different this year?

MS: I am living evidence of moderate optimism. I don't think we can talk of a Tour of Renewal or of a revolution in cycling. One cannot go abruptly into an idyllic situation with zero positive cases. Nevertheless I do think that a true taking of conscience has occurred in the world of cycling. The repetition of these affairs has created many problems for cycling and mentalities are evolving.

TXT: Has the introduction of the blood passport after the Astana scandal last year, in your opinion, forced a change in the comportment of cyclists?

MS: Yes, I think that the riders are more attentive and fearful of being nailed. Sadly, the passport cannot be used this year because the Tour de France is not part of the UCI calendar. And, the UCI refuses to put the passports to use for the Tour organizers (ASO).

TXT: Doesn't the conflict between the organizers of the Grand Tours and the UCI put an efficient fight against doping in peril?

MS: Unfortunately yes. These conflicts are really troubling. Alas, the financial stakes and prestige don't contribute enough to bring forth a greater credibility in the heart of the greater public. We really need to see that these different agents recommence to hold a dialogue so that we arrive at a global optimization of the fight (against doping).

TXT: The juridical aspects of the blood passport equally pose certain questions. Without proof of administration of substances, don't we risk observing more and more such interminable procedures such as that of Floyd Landis?

MS: Effectively, that is one of the key points that will have to be resolved as rapidly as possible. We must find a different route to prove manipulation.

TXT: So, what would this other route consist of?

MS: Certain jurists estimate that instead of penal sanctions, it may be better to apply medical sanctions. As such, on could instead retire racers from a competition if their blood characteristics are suspect. We have to find a just solution, so as to avoid to enter into judicial procedures of incredible length and which put down the credibility of the antidoping fight, as it was in the Landis affair.

TXT: Other than blood doping, there exists a mass of more classical doping forms (anabolisants, testosterone). The antidoping fight is it really more efficient for such products?

MS: I think that there are always people that will try to trick the system with these genres of products. The testosterone is for example difficult to discern if one is restrained only to post–race urine tests. Because of this fact one has to be more creative in the harvesting of samples, in going to test at the right moment, often at their home. This is what has become known as 'intelligence testing' (Ww note: en Français – “l'intelligence testing”).

TXT: That could implicate intrusions of more and more gravity in the private sphere. Will cyclists accept that?

MS: Unavoidably this will get down to a supplemental loss of liberty. But the racers will have to accept this, so as to arrive more rapidly to the goal of a clean sport of cycling. So that the public, the media and the sponsors continue to follow, cyclists are more than ever ready to make extra efforts. There is certainly an 'old guard' that shows itself as a bit more reticent, but the young are conscious of the sacrifice that will bring a better gloss to their races (Ww: FR – “redorer le blason”).

TXT: Other than the forms of traditional doping previously evoked, a new menace is appearing, that of 'genetic doping'. Does that cause any fear to you?

MS: At the moment, I am of the sentiment that the implantation of modified genes in a human body is not really on the menu. On the other hand, what causes me worry is metabolism modification by utilization of 'inductive substances' (Ww: FR – “substances inductrices”), that's to say substances which are going to stimulate the production of red blood cells or of endogenous EPO. For this reason, the introduction of the veritable biological passport and not only blood is necessary. There is an urgency to find these 'parades' (Ww: ???).

TXT: Finally, in view of the difficulties of the anti-doping fight, isn't it necessary to simply legalize the taking of prohibited products in the elite sports, which have become 'sport–business'?

MS: Personally, I think that there is no future for any legalized doping in sport. This would be a very sad message for our society. It would be as if someone demanded that I took amphetamines before going to work! One has to accept the body's limits and learn again the pleasure of performance. Competition of itself has to rise above the search for new records.

Disclaimer

The opinions expressed by WADAwatch are
strictly formed with the purpose of inciting WADA to adhere
to its Fundamental Rationale, achieve its goals and fulfil
the aspirations of its Signatories, in achieving the
highest possible level of objective, neutral
science in sport-doping control.

A public service provided by

.................@...............WADAwatch

Riders! On the Tour...

Riders on the Tour...

Riders on the Tour...
Into this house were born;
Into this Lab were thrown:

Like a dog without a bone;
An actor out on loan - Riders on the Tour...
(Parody of the Doors: "Riders on the Storm")

Riders of the Tour!

The Tour de France beckons (unless you are with Astana: then this won't concern you, we are sad to state)...

How do you feel, Riders of the Tour de France, about the French National anti–doping Laboratoire, the LNDD?

Is it the best in the world?

Or is it the most over–ruled anti–doping Laboratoire in the WADA system?

Do the names Armstrong, Landaluce, Landis, Mayo, if found in the same sentence as “LNDD”, fill you with some mixed emotions? That sinking feeling in your gut?

If you are a Pro Tour or 'other' team cyclist whose group have been invited to the Tour 2008, its time to think about the newly-devised race control system that is about to be offloaded onto your shoulders. You, who we admire if and when we know you are clean, are entering the Biggest (cycling) Show on Earth, which for the first time perhaps in its modern history, shall be organized and implemented outside the UCI Rules.

Riders of Paris–Nice already have their experiences. Same for the Paris–Roubaix... and we can only hope that the experiences of March and April have given the French enough input that they can put on the race that they think is best achieved away from the UCI.

In fact, be aware that there remains a question as to whether the Fédération française de cyclisme, or FFC, can in fact host a race that is not run within the structure of the UCI.

Anyone reading the FFC rules, which control any French, non–UCI event (local citizens' races, cyclosportifs, and junior national programs, etc), must be aware that nearly every clause makes at least one reference to 'the UCI rules', whether those be 'under the UCI', 'as established by the UCI', or any of the hundreds of stipulations.

But since the Amaury Sport Organisation, or ASO, broke ranks by leading a revolt against the UCI, and 'promised' to hold its race independently of the global cyling organization, the turbulence promised by such acts falls, ultimately, upon your shoulders. Where does that leave a rider?

If the UCI is officially 'unwelcomed' by the ASO group that owns the Tour de France, and if events happen that call the FFC rulebook into question, how is any rule, with a reference to the corresponding UCI Rules, going to be interpreted?

Only subsequent justice would answer that question, and a swift read of the AFLD Decision (Mais bien sûr! C'est en français) involving a second, and perhaps–illegitimate process taken against Floyd Landis, from 2006 to 2007, reveals that 'French Administrative Justice' comes down to being 'whatever we want it to be'.

In the Decision that emerged from this extraordinary second French case against Landis, no judges are named, no expert's testimony appears to have been cross–examined, and the sum total of damning evidence that is contained in that record, was that the Agency published its 'Decision' (Derision?), miraculously on the same calendar day as it received the bulk of Landis' Attorneys' legal filings.

Unclear as these legally damning items were, even more so is the questionable legitimacy of the legal regulation under which Landis was prosecuted in France. The one clear part of this ultralight decision, is that it states categorically that France holds jurisdiction over this man as an 'unlicensed cyclist'.

But, you, as a peer of Floyd, know that he has always held a license from USACycling. He has been a 'licensed American pro cyclist' every year his foot touched a pedal in the Tour. How then, can the French Agence française du lutte du dopage, or AFLD, prosecute him as unlicensed? How could any French Appellate Court, whether administrative or otherwise, not overturn such a blatantly unreal reality?

Boggling the mind...

So this is the Strangelovian world you all enter, as our friends, our heros, or... as goats if found 'positive'.

And as the focal point of the French anti–doping world, the LNDD laboratoire – that will process your collected tests for doping control purposes – is only the most notoriously incompetent laboratoire in the system of WADA–accredited labs.

LNDD already lost one case from 2006 (Landaluce: failure to uphold ISL testing requirements), lost a contract to run doping controls on the ITF's tested players at Roland Garros last year, to the WADA–accredited lab in Montreal (only 3400 km from the stadium, itself being no more than 18 km across Parisian suburbs from LNDD!), and, the real topper: it went on vacation in the middle of its busiest testing season of 2007, perhaps as an un–notified 'work stoppage' action (?!) in protest of the growing animosity between anything French that is related to Cycling and the UCI.

SIDEBAR: The UCI had published the famous Vrijman report, in the spring of 2006, which objectively and neutrally thrashed that laboratoire's infamous 'research' that had led to an article against Lance Armstrong, which was published in the French sports–rag l'Equipe. Vrijman noted, in a very linear and clear fashion, how French government officials, the former WADA president Dick Pound, and the l'Equipe journalist had unanimously appeared unable or unwilling to assist the UCI to investigate the Armstrong allegations. Recalling paragraph 1.14 of Vrijman is very important:

“Despite the recognition of the proper jurisdiction of the independent investigator by all individuals and organizations that were contacted, the French Ministry, the LNDD and WADA, all refused to provide the investigator with the documents and full cooperation necessary to reach definite conclusions on certain issues that remain unresolved. The refusal by the LNDD, the French Ministry and WADA to provide documents and information that are necessary for the proper conduct of a complete investigation is extremely troubling and is inconsistent with the principles of the Olympic Movement. The fact that WADA President Dick Pound and the LNDD’s Professor De Ceaurriz were willing to discuss the research project and its results in great detail with the media, while they at the same time were unwilling to cooperate with a proper investigation by the organization with jurisdiction over this matter, raises substantial questions regarding their reasons for doing so and makes one wonder as to what complete cooperation would disclose.”

Consequent to the sum total of these events, it remains astonishing that ASO could even consider opening its organizational 'voice' against violations against the WADA CODE, as it has, consistently throughout the years, through its one – hundred per cent ownership of the l'Equipe paper, been in continuous recidivism as to violations of WADA regulations that guarantee Athletes' rights to confidentiality, by 'scooping' information about not only Tour riders' A Sample doping control results.

As a internationally–contracted laboratoire in the WADA system, perhaps it is a good thing that it proved, once and for all in 2007, which of its priorities were the most dear:

Going on vacation?

By stopping the process, after unveiling an A Sample positive control held against Spanish rider Iban Mayo, and shutting down its facility “because we are French, and this is the French vacation month” (which WADAwatch is unaware that it ever 'stopped' work on previous years' samples), its outrageous acts forced the UCI, the IF that had contracted and paid it for more than these manifestly sub–standard services... to track down another facility, which was itself an unjust act, falling outside the conditions of WADA ISL Articles 5.2.4.3.2.1 “”B” Sample analysis should occur as soon as possible and should be completed within thirty (30) days of notification of an ”A” Sample Adverse Analytical Finding.” AND Article 5.2.4.3.2.2: ““B” Sample confirmation must be performed in the same Laboratory as the “A” Sample confirmation.”).

Leaving the details of these matters aside, there is only one common element that runs throughout: an entity within the French Government, which is accredited by a global international Sporting association (which isn't per se in the business of 'accrediting' Labs: it's happy to take the word of any national body that belongs to ILAC...), has much support from WADA, in its quest to achieve convictions... if only they could remember that they themselves have strict rules to follow.
(PHOTO: Professeur De Ceaurriz and M. Lamour,
ex-Ministre de la Jeunesse et Sports, colleague unknown)

Here at WADAwatch, we consider it a good thing that the 2012 Summer Olympics were awarded to the British.

After all, how could you run a
Summer Games when the laboratoire
staff are all down in St. Tropez,
over in Guadalupe or up in Chamonix,
discussing...

how important their work is?

But hopefully you follow me...
"Riders of the Tour... daa da-da da daaaa..."

Disclaimer

The opinions expressed by WADAwatch are
strictly formed with the purpose of inciting WADA to adhere
to its Fundamental Rationale, achieve its goals and fulfil
the aspirations of its Signatories, in achieving the
highest possible level of objective, neutral
science in sport-doping control.

Watching WADA, and LNDD... and more,

.................@...............WADAwatch

2008 all copyrights reserved

Was the French Lab ... ON STRIKE?

Anyone following the now-world-famous Iban Mayo EPO test fiasco is surely aware by now, that the French Lab formerly called the LNDD (now the AFLD département des analyses: "D.d.A.") was, perhaps irregularly, replaced as a testing facility, to administer the Mayo 'B Confirmation sample' testing.

This action came about by executive decision of the UCI, which contracts for testing services at the races being run under its rules, on a daily basis for those participating elite riders. This is standard, and done as such because the pro cyclists are holding UCI licenses through their national Cycling Federations.

But at WADAwatch, a new theory is brewing, that the D.d.A., which suffered brutal and embarrassing exposure to its "laissez-faire" hiring and training of technicians through the Floyd Landis 'testosterone' hearings in May of 2007, has simply, and irrevocably....................
gone bureaucratically..............
insane.

(OR! Maybe I have watched too many Kubrick films?)


How does one provide electroshock therapy to a group such as the D.d.A.?

Forgive my extremely-expressed doubts, but this is certainly becoming an intolerable situation, for the world that watches, and the cyclists who are fearing to participate.

For an accredited laboratory to call up that International Federation that is paying it to perform testing, at the singular most prestigious annual sporting event, the Tour de France, and inform them that...

"the doors are to be shut, and that the work-in-progress cannot be finished, because 'Zees ees ze time for ze vacations."

...is absurd.

Or... pathetic?

If only Stanley Kubrick were still alive, among us to write a script with ZENmud productions...


Taking Humbert Humbert from Lolita, Dr Strangelove from... yes, the movie itself, or Dr Ludivico from A Clockwork Orange, and our favorite HAL9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey; there is truth in art, as surely if not more than that 'truth' found in the recent WADA-accredited laboratory 'fiascos'... a word that cannot oft enough be repeated.

But how did UCI, which has known about the apparent failures in the French LNDD-D.d.A. laboratory for some three years or more, take the actions that sent the Mayo 'B Confirmation sample' to Ghent, a separate lab, in a differenct country?

As previously cited, here and elsewhere, Anne Gripper, the relatively recently-appointed UCI anti-doping Czarina, has been cited in discussing, in a somewhat uncomprehendingly (to this author) manner, the consequent steps of a potential AAF.

The fall-out from this Summer's Tour de France certainly left the Union Cycliste Internationale with some strange questions to answer, from Tour de France organizers, competitors, teams and the Press.

Was the strain too much?

Or... a SWAG (Stupid, wild-ass guess) moment: did the D.d.A. simply go on strike?

Could Professeur Jacques de Ceaurriz have taken a vacation, along with his entire staff, at the same August period last summer when they were feverishly claiming Floyd Landis' culpability?

It doesn't flow, in WADAwatch-think, that we've never heard discussion of the then-LNDD being under constraints by a national French vacation ritual.

Where will the truth fall, who wins and who loses, when the World Anti-doping Agency (WADA) rules are not followed by those whose jobs depend on their continual scientific accuracy, their unwavering ethical priorities, or is their 'Stick it!' attitude towards a world that doesn't comprehend, what is the dominant factor?

There are only three weeks until the WADA World Conference in Madrid, and frankly, WADA has a lot of un-drafted modifications necessary to perform the task it has taken on.

WADAwatch believes that the first order of business in Madrid, on November 15th, is to entertain a motion NOT to approve the newly-revised WADA CODE 2007.

For the betterment of sport, it is imperative that similar discussions to append and improve the work of laboratories take precedence over any tightening of controls on the Athletes who are reeling under the weight of mis-applied testing procedures and un-harmonious standards around the world...

Please contact your national laboratory, if you reside in one of the countries that has one or more of the now-33 accredited laboratories, and ask them to respond to the questions that they were presented weeks ago, in the crystelZENmud Questionnaire for WADA laboratories.

And never EVER stop thinking that we must, together,


Watch! WADA
..........@..........WADAwatch

Mayo and the LNDD 'Breach of Contract'

Does it dawn on the rest of the Sporting world, as it does to WADAwatch, that according to the regulations found in the WADA CODE, in Articles 7 (Results Management), Article 8 (Right to a Fair Hearing) and 14 (Confidentiality and Reporting), that no one, anywhere in the entire world of journalists, UCI, TdF staff: no one, has the right to be discussing the Iban Mayo case as of today?

The words cannot be more clear and precise:

The identity of Athletes whose Samples have resulted in Adverse Analytical Findings, or Athletes or other Persons who were alleged by an Anti-doping Organization to have violated other anti-doping rules, may be publicly disclosed by the Anti-doping Organization with results management responsibility no earlier than completion of the administrative review in Articles 7.1 and 7.2.

Suffice it to inform that Articles 7.1 and 7.2 are how to inform an Athlete of the A Sample test, and also in 7.2 how to proceed through the B Confirmation test, and attain a laboratory documentation package from the laboratory which performed the testing.

Another blatant violation of a cyclist's rights?


Watch! WADA
..........@..........WADAwatch

Is French Lab in Breach of Contract???

WADAwatch was interested in the aspects surrounding the news of the Iban Mayo EPO case, that came to light on 23 October 2007, via news reports (Reuters, the Canadian Press, VeloNews or, en français, l'Equipe) of 'unreadable' B Sample conclusions in the Belgian laboratory in Ghent.

Several amazing aspects of this case have come to mind, and this short post again will only touch on those.

The first aspect is this: as a 'Major Event Organization', the Amaury Sport Organization, operating the Tour de France as a UCI-licensed ProTour event (whether they appreciate that august distinction is a different story), is obliged to provide doping-testing services and facilities, which, for as long as this author knows, have been contracted out to the former Laboratoire Nationale du dépistage du dopage (LNDD), which is now renamed the 'département des analyses' under the Agence française de lutte antidopage.

WADAwatch is amazed, that in the contract that encumbers the above-mentioned parties, that the 'LNDD-cum-DDA' is provided to take a vacation during the middle of their most important, perhaps highest-paying, and certainly the most media-attracting series of tests that they perform annually.

While discussing this, does anyone recall that former 2006 Tour de France victor Floyd Landis, based his arguments on the incapacities (or incompetences) found in the violations of multiple regulations that govern the WADA-accredited labs? He requested his B Confirmation samples be tested at a separate facility, a request that he was denied.

So it is impressive to see that now, apparently, in 2007, the laboratory that is best known as a recidivist agent for leaking A Sample test results to the French sporting journal l'Equipe, decided it was more important to shut down for vacation, than to perform the terms of the contract that they held, perhaps with UCI, perhaps with TdF, perhaps with the Federation française de cyclisme, whoever...

So that Iban Mayo's samples were expedited off to the laboratory in Ghent, Belgium, where they were found 'illegible'.

So the next query, is how did a 'clear positive' A Sample show up in a separate laboratory, and become illegible? Was it mishandled? Improperly stored? Defrosted and then re-frozen? Is the Chain of Custody no help in providing additional information?

And while the Spanish cycling federation had previously proclaimed this B sample to be 'negative', the UCI (and Pat McQuaid, President, as well as Anne Gripper) wants the sample brought back to the LNDD-Département des analyses for a second, 'readable' testing session.

Is this fair to Iban Mayo?

Fair that LNDD, in the priorities it apparently holds dear, which, provisionally, are:

• a) to leak 'A Sample' results to l'Equipe,
• b) go on vacation,
• c) perform its contractual duties

Remember clearly written in the rules, is an aspect of confidentiality, which apparently in France only relates clearly, in law, to the marital life of its President, and his recent divorce.

Is this fair, that two labs within several hours of each other, and both accredited by WADA, cannot perform a test in the 'reasonable time' that the law requires?

Anne Gripper was quoted as having said (by the CanadianPress website):

"To ensure that the rider could have the B done more quickly, we transferred the sample, but the Ghent laboratory just couldn't get the sample to confirm the Paris" result, Gripper said.

Read that carefully, literally. Were those her true words?

It is not in the WADA CODE, or International Standard for Laboratories, nor the International Standard for testing, that a B Sample 'must confirm the Paris result'.

Translation error? Typing error?

An A Sample test, done objectively, professionally and by the WADA regulations, must reveal results that are reproducible. Data must be protected. Files must be correct, and the Chain of Custody impeccable. The B Sample may reveal that the A sample test is not accurate.

'Insuring that the rider could have the B result more quickly' is not what the rules state.

Now between WADA, UCI and the French or Belgian laboratories, it is hard to believe that Mayo hasn't a pure case of laboratory intransigence, or malfeasance, on which to proceed in justice. UCI itself, in publishing the Vrijman report, has been on notice about the apparent scientific capacities of the French laboratory, and if perhaps it has, itself, been used by this laboratory, would be a sad event,

In WADAwatch's opinion.


Watch! WADA
..........@..........WADAwatch

The LAST STRAW in France... the Iban Mayo case

One could hardly have predicted this, and WADAwatch must take the evening to absorb and finesse a new exposé on the former LNDD laboratory, which now stands in the light of pure conceit or incompetence.

There is no doubt now, that it is at least one of those two.

Given the news today, from Reuters:

"We are waiting for the Spanish federation's report but anyway, the 'B' sample will be tested again in Paris," McQuaid told Reuters.

"The Paris lab was closed when the sample was to be tested and it was tested in Ghent," McQuaid added.

This post will be elaborated on between now and Friday, but there is clear proof that the AFLD 'département des analyses' has no respect for the job it is charged with. A lab that prefers to go on vacation, instead of studiously performing its tasks in an expeditious manner, should not be allowed to retain WADA accreditation.

After it tried to sabotage Lance Armstrong...

After it tried to sabotage Floyd Landis...

Now Iban Mayo...

Much much much more to come...

Watch! WADA
..........@..........WADAwatch