PGA to enhance drug testing

The PGA Tour announced plans to add blood testing to its anti-doping policy, and its revised list of banned substances will be in line with the World Anti-Doping Association.

The PGA Tour is beefing up its anti-doping policy by adding blood testing and bringing its list of banned substances in line with the World Anti-Doping Association.

The revised policy takes effect in October, at the start of next season.

Blood testing will allow the tour to detect any use of human growth hormone, which is on the list of banned substances but cannot be detected through urine. However, the tour still plans to use urine samples for the majority of its drug testing next season.

“Urine is the far more efficient testing method of 98 percent-plus of what we’re looking for,” said Andy Levinson, the tour’s senior vice president of tournament administration, who oversees the anti-doping policy. “Really, one of the few things only detectable in blood is HGH.”

Levinson said blood testing also detects substances that are common in more high-endurance sports, such as cycling, but that the tour doesn’t see them as applicable to a sport like golf.

“For that reason, urine will be the predominant method of testing,” he said.

Under the revised policy, the tour is adding to its banned list three categories of substances that WADA already prohibits — asthma medications, allergy and anti-inflammatory medications, and pseudoephedrine over a certain threshold. He said the process for therapeutic use exemptions (TUE) involving some of those additional substances would be adjusted to make the response time quicker.

And in a slight move toward more transparency, the tour would start reporting suspensions for drugs of abuse. Under the current policy, the tour is required to announce when a player has been suspended only for performance-enhancing drugs. Recreational drugs fell under the tour’s private “conduct unbecoming a professional” disciplinary policy.

However, if players test positive for drugs of abuse, that won’t be reported unless the player is actually suspended.