Topic: News:3 Strikes & Out for Australia But No Stop in Sight

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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Intelligence the Way for ASADA
By Nicole Jeffery

THE Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority will later this week announce the findings of its first major investigation into weightlifting.

But the process has already convinced ASADA chairman Richard Ings that the new body's investigative powers have become its main weapon in the ongoing fight against doping in sport.

In the past, drug-testing has been the central plank of the anti-doping campaign but Ings announced a shift towards investigation, which can address a broader range of doping violations, including trafficking, possession and administration of drugs.

"Testing will always be important ... but investigation is the way ahead," he said.

Of the 15 athletes who have been caught doping since ASADA was established in March, only one was sanctioned as the result of investigation.

Sydney grade rugby league player Matthew Eather was suspended for two years in October after he revealed under questioning from ASADA investigators that he had taken human growth hormone (HGH).

Eather also returned a positive drug test to the anabolic steroid nandrolone.

Ings stressed that no athlete had ever been caught using HGH through drug-testing. There has been a test available for the drug since 2004, but it is of limited use because there is only a tiny window of a few hours for the testers to detect the substance before it breaks down in the body.

"We detected this case through our investigative capability, getting out there and talking to the athlete and determining that the violation occurred," Ings said.

"Where we have matters involving athletes, we don't just leave them with the positive test, we're inquiring with the athletes where they source the products from, so that we can take a holistic view of not just who is using the product, but where they bought it from, and who sold it to them.

"Identifying individuals who may be involved in trafficking and distributing prohibited substances is one of our highest priorities."

ASADA is hopeful of employing the whistleblower provisions of the World Anti-Doping Agency code to further its investigations.

The WADA code allows for a 50 per cent reduction in an athlete's penalty if he or she provides information that leads to sanctioning of other individuals.

ASADA has two full-time investigative officers with a support team and access to information uncovered by federal agencies including the Australian Customs Service, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, and the Australian Federal Police.

"We can put an officer on someone's doorstep in 12 hours," Ings said.

ASADA opened a hotline (1800 645 700) in April for callers to phone in with information about drug abuse and Ings said this had been extremely helpful.

"In some cases, it has resulted in sanctions," he said.

He also confirmed that ASADA was shifting its focus from random to targeted testing, based on intelligence-gathering.

It will unveil a more comprehensive "whereabouts" system in March, that will enable athletes to register their whereabouts quickly and easily on-line for out-of-competition testing, a requirement of most testing programs.

The weightlifting inquiry was sparked by the suspension of four weightlifters for the use of the same stimulant this year and allegations that another lifter had supplied drugs.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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Coffa to Face Full Weight of Inquiry
By Peter Kogoy

PRESIDENT of the Australian Weightlifting Federation Salvatore 'Sam' Coffa will go under the microscope when the long-awaited release of the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority probe into drugs is made public in Sydney tomorrow.

As part of an extensive probe, American lawyer Richard Young, an investigator attached to the World Anti-Doping Authority, will take Coffa to task for his autocratic management style and inaction over the sport's repeated doping offences.

Coffa, 70, who is also the International Weightlifting Federation first vice-president and was re-elected four weeks ago for another term as president of the Australian Commonwealth Games Association, has been in charge of Australian weightlifting since 1983.

Young this month successfully obtained what is understood to be sensitive computer data from Coffa's offices in Hawthorn, in Melbourne's east.

The data is understood to detail Coffa's domination of the sport dating back to the early 1980s, including a lack of financial records and governance issues which resulted in the Australian Sports Commission cutting off the sport's annual taxpayer-funded grants.

Since the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne ended in March the ASC has frozen the funding set aside to hire a national head coach.

Luke Borreggine, the strength and conditioning coach with Wests Tigers NRL club in Sydney, had been earmarked for the position.

It is understood Young's report does not link Coffa to a parallel probe into allegations of systemic drug abuse by athletes.

"At this stage I've no idea what's in the ASADA report," Coffa said yesterday. "All I know is that Young did look into athletes taking a freely available stimulant out of competition.

"You can drink and eat gallons of it, but apparently not in competition.

"Not one Australian lifter has returned a positive test since the Melbourne Commonwealth Games. I don't believe that Young can recommend the dismissal of my executive under the terms of reference of the present inquiry."

Coffa said his eight-member AWF executive had been promised an advance copy of Young's report and would discuss his findings today, but wouldn't go public before ASADA makes the report public tomorrow.

Young was appointed by ASADA chairman Richard Ings to investigate any alleged drug links in the sport following a series of Australian weightlifters testing positive in the past two years.

Before taking up the ASADA investigation, Young was involved in the US anti-doping inquiry into the Balco conspiracy that led to a number of leading American athletes being handed lengthy bans.

Ings called in Young after two Tasmanian weightlifters, Camilla Fogagnolo and Jenna Myers, tested positive to a banned stimulant. The Young report will also look at the drug conviction of banned lifter Caleb Loades and investigate the banned athletes Sergo Chakhoyan and Corran Hocking, who tested positive to the stimulant benzylpiperazine.

An ASC spokesman said last night: "The ASC has made it clear in writing why funding was suspended in 2005 and will not be restored until a number of issues are resolved to our satisfaction and not before the ASADA probe is completed.

"The ASC did make ex-gratia payments of around $60,000 to 11 elite lifters," the spokesman said.

Weightlifting Australia received only one quarterly payment of an AIS grant amounting to $359,000 in the 2005-2006 financial year.

By way of comparison, out of a budget of $69.5 million, swimming received $5.4m, rowing $5.1m, hockey $4.7m and cycling received $4.6m.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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Doping Report Urges Weightlifting Clean-Up

The President of the Australian Weightlifting Federation (AWF) has refused to step down despite the release of a critical report into drug use in the sport.

The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) has recommended a series of testing, monitoring and educational initiatives designed to clean up weightlifting.

ASADA chairman Richard Ings says the nine-month investigation revealed the extent of the drug problem throughout different levels of the sport.

"This investigation has firstly uncovered evidence of organised distribution and supply channels for a range of prohibited substances including steroids, human growth hormone and bzp," he said.

"As a result, several persons of interest are assisting ASDA with its ongoing investigation."

AWF president Sam Coffa says the federation will take on board the report's recommendations, but he will not be held accountable for problems in the sport.

"I will wait until I read the report and find out the outcomes, the findings and if there are any other additional recommendations, we will take those on board," he said.

"Certainly it is not my intention to resign from my position or the board for that matter."

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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Weightlifting Drug Ring Exposed

POLICE are investigating a sophisticated drug-trafficking ring operating inside the Australian weightlifting community.

Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority chairman Richard Ings said investigators had found evidence of an organised distribution network selling a range of prohibited substances, including steroids, human growth hormone and the stimulant benzylpiperazine (BZP).

After a nine-month investigation, US anti-doping official Richard Young revealed yesterday that he was co-operating with law enforcement agencies including the Australian Customs Service, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and Victorian and South Australian police.

Computer forensic scientists working for Mr Young are understood to have uncovered data, believed to be phone and credit-card records, linking drug-trafficking to other sports.

Mr Ings said several persons of interest were assisting the authority. "These are very serious matters but, by law, ASADA cannot comment further on them while the investigation continues," Mr Ings said.

"The report findings, however, strongly support ASADA's stance that testing alone will not uncover all anti-doping violations and that investigations (of this nature) are essential to preserve the integrity of sport."

Mr Young was appointed to investigate drugs in weightlifting in March after two Tasmanian weightlifters, Camilla Fogagnolo and Jenna Myers, tested positive to a banned stimulant after buying a supplement from a third woman, Belinda Van Tienen.

The report also found that the positive drug tests by four Australian weightlifters in October last year are likely to have resulted from the consumption of nutritional supplements boosted by BZP.

Van Tienen, the subject of an Australian Sports Commission review and the Young investigation, was officially cleared yesterday of any knowledge that the supplement had contained BZP. "Weightlifting in this country has had a dubious track record. In the last four years 10 competitors had tested positive ... more than any other sport," Mr Ings said.

"To date, Corren Hocking, Jenna Myers and Camilla Fogagnolo had received two-year sanctions and a fourth is still awaiting a hearing before the Court of Arbitration for Sport. All these matters relate to the use of the powerful stimulant BZP.

"In addition, a fifth weightlifter is the subject of allegations from within the sport of weightlifting of trafficking in BZP."

Mr Young and his team conducted more than 75 interviews and looked at the drug conviction of former weightlifter Caleb Loades, who was stripped of more than $350,000 in assets following a drug trafficking conviction and suspicions of money laundering.

Australian Weightlifting Federation president Salvatore Coffa and his seven-man board have kept their jobs. And federal funding of the sport, frozen since the Commonwealth Games in March, will resume once the AWF meets criteria as laid down by ASADA.

"We will continue to co-operate with ASADA in any ongoing investigation," Mr Coffa said in a statement.

The report was backed by the Australian Sports Commission.

"This is a vindication of the strong new investigatory powers given by the federal Government to the organisation when it was formed earlier this year," ASC chief executive Mark Peters said.

[John Way]

http://www.smh.com.au/news/sport/lifters-face-bans-after-drugs-probe/2007/02/28/1172338707498.html

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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AUSTRALIAN weightlifting was last night reeling after another positive drug test and there's speculation more lifters could be implicated.

Mitchil Mann, 19, has been banned from the sport for two years after twice testing positive to the anabolic agent clenbuterol. The samples were taken in out-of-competition testing in Sydney in October and November.

Clenbuterol is on the World Anti-Doping Agency's banned list. It is used to treat racehorses that suffer from asthma and other respiratory problems.

It's understood Mann's two-year ban could be just the beginning of a crackdown on drug cheats in weightlifting.

There are four other Aussie lifters awaiting results and possible suspensions. - AAP with Jim Wilson

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

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Drugs Investigation Nets Fourth Victim

Australian weightlifting's doping investigation dealt out its fourth drugs ban on Wednesday, while another four lifters are awaiting hearings for alleged offences.

The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) announced a two-year suspension for weightlifter Mitchil Mann after he twice tested positive to the anabolic agent Clenbuterol.

Nineteen-year-old Mann has not represented Australia at junior or senior level.

He tested positive to the banned substance, normally used by vets as an asthma treatment for animals, in out-of-competition testing in Sydney.

ASADA chairman Richard Ings said the suspension came during phase two of the investigation, which began in March last year.

"This suspension is proof of ASADA's determination to protect the integrity of the sport of weightlifting in Australia," Ings said.

"Clenbuterol is a serious performing enhancing agent, it's commonly used as a veterinary product to treat asthma in, predominantly, race horses.

"It has steroidal properties and that's why it's banned for use by athletes."

Three Australian weightlifters were slapped with two-year bans last year for offences relating to the stimulant BZP.

The ASADA investigation, which also involves police, was prompted by 10 sanctions in the past four years meted out to weightlifters, more than any other sport in Australia.

"As a result of the investigation there were five entries made on the register of findings," Ings said.

"One of those matters has now been concluded with the announcement today of Mitchil Mann accepting a two-year suspension.

"The other four matters are still pending tribunals."

Matthew Curtain, the chief executive of the Australian Weightlifting Federation, said his organisation was working on a plan agreed with ASADA last year to try to beat the drug cheats.

"It just reinforces our commitment with the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority that we support pure performance in sport," he said.

"If athletes wish to try to cheat the system and do something untoward, they will be caught by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority."

In a December report at the end of the investigation's first phase, Ings said it had uncovered evidence of organised distribution and supply channels for prohibited substances including steroids, human growth hormone and BZP.

Mann's suspension took effect on October 30 last year and he is eligible to resume competition at midnight on October 29, 2008.

[Rowan Lean]

There is always plenty of drama surrounding weightlifting and positive drug tests, but just because people are being caught doesnt mean australian athletes are the only ones on the gear!