One Nike athlete will be on drugs for life because of Salazar’s methods

AN athlete at the Nike Oregon Project has been told they will have to take thyroid drugs for the rest of their life because they were misprescribed the medicine while training at the centre run by Alberto Salazar, Sir Mo Farah’s former coach.

Salazar was last week banned for four years for anti-doping offences.

The Cuban-born US coach was the founder and driving force of the Nike centre for elite distance runners, where Salazar and the centre’s doctor were accused of exploiting Therapeutic Use Exemptions, asthma prescriptions and diagnosing hypothyroidism to boost the performance of its athletes.

Travis Tygart, head of the US Anti-Doping Agency who led the prosecution, says Salazar’s methods threatened the health of his athletes and that one of his former athletes now needs ongoing thyroid drugs.

Nike Oregon Project (NOP) athletes were routinely tested for asthma and hypothyroidism and used infusions of the latest supplement products under the direction of Salazar, who had several athletes competing at the Doha World Championships including Sifan Hassan, women’s 10,000m champion.

Salazar, who is appealing the judgement, has been banned because he had instigated an experiment which saw banned substance testosterone applied to his sons to see how much cream it took before an athlete would test positive, and for organising an infusion of a legal product, L-Carnitine, but at banned levels.

Tygart, who also brought down cyclist Lance Armstrong, said: ‘This has to open up the discussion for sport: do we want athletes to become, to a certain extent, experimented on to see what [prescription] drugs are going to give them the biggest performance advantage? And that, in order to compete at the highest levels, you have to go on these drugs, which have serious side effects?

‘One athlete [formerly at NOP] has to stay on thyroxanol [a thyroid drug] for the rest of their life because they were put on it wrongly and it altered their thyroid system and they now can’t ever be off the drug.

‘We have to ensure that the medicalisation of sport does not become commonplace.’

Tygart pointed to the ban also handed out to Jeffrey Brown, the endocrinologist who worked with NOP athletes, saying that the judgement drew attention to a ‘conflicting and dual role when a doctor is paid for by a sponsor and is also giving medical advice and direction in concert with the coach to the athletes: whether it’s L-Carnitine, the vitamin D prescriptions, whether it’s the calcitonin [a thyroid drug], whether it’s the thyroid injections … the [asthma] inhalers, this is where folks that want to exploit the system are really pushing it.’

He dismissed the culture of marginal gains in sport when it is applied to medical procedures.

‘If you get it [marginal gains] through hard work and training more, fine. If you get it through abusing prescription medication that has harmful side-effects, that’s a whole different story

‘This is the new frontier; exploiting the TUE process if it’s not robust. It’s manipulating the rules to your favour as best you can, trying not to step over [the line] because you’re fearful you’re going to get caught.

‘It’s finding the margins. On the good hand it’s way away from what we saw in the late 90s and 2000s — blood transfusions, EPO use, designer steroids. What we now see is those who will try to find the best way to increase performance to the maximum and get as close to the line and unfortunately sometimes folks lose focus and cross that line. That’s certainly what happened.

‘That’s a good statement for how far anti-doping has come. But that doesn’t mean crossing a line is not something that ought to be held accountable. It has to be held accountable. There are big advantages to be gained by those who attempt to exploit the cracks.’

L-Carnitine was a new supplement developed by the University of Exeter which helped turn fat into energy but taken orally it took 24 weeks to be effective. Salazar devised a method of infusing the L-Carnitine and was banned by USADA because when testing it on an assistant coach, Steve Magness, they went over the 50ml limit allowed by anti-doping rules. Going over the limit meant the L-Carnitine had much quicker and more beneficial effects.

On being informed of the initial benefits to Magness, Salazar emailed Lance Armstrong, who was serving a lifetime ban from cycling but training for the Ironman, and wrote: ‘Lance, call me asap! We have tested it and it’s amazing! You are the only athlete I’m going to tell the actual numbers to other than Galen Rupp [Farah’s training partner and Olympic silver medallist]. It’s too incredible. All completely legal and natural. You will finish the Iron Man in about 16 minutes less while taking this — Alberto.’

Salazar, Nike and Dr Brown’s lawyers did not respond to a request for comment.