Farah denies new drugs claims as pressure grows to axe coach
Champion insists he has never broken the rules Report says Salazar put athletes’ health at risk
Sir Mo Farah and Alberto Salazar have hit back at a series of damning doping allegations as pressure builds on the four-time Olympic champion to ditch his coach amid claims of mistreating prescription medication and abusing drug infusions.
Twenty months after allegations first surfaced questioning Salazar’s practices, a leaked United States Anti-Doping Agency draft report claimed the American coach had “almost certainly” broken anti-doping rules.
According to the report, Salazar used a banned method of infusing a legal substance called L-carnitine and put athletes, including Farah, at risk by issuing them with potentially harmful prescription medication to boost athletic performance when they had no medical need.
Farah, who was knighted in the New Year Honours list, has continually stuck by his coach and maintained his stance after the latest allegations emerged yesterday. “It’s deeply frustrating that I’m having to make an announcement on this subject,” he said. “I am a clean athlete who has never broken the rules in regards to substances, methods or dosages and it is upsetting that some parts of the media, despite the clear facts, continue to try to associate me with allegations of drug misuse.”
In his statement, which did not mention Salazar by name, Farah added: “As I’ve said many times beAthletics fore we all should do everything we can to have a clean sport and it is entirely right that anyone who breaks the rules should be punished.”
The latest allegations claim a number of athletes at Salazar’s Nike Oregon Project were given infusions of the chemical L-carnitine – a naturally-produced amino acid prescribed as a supplement for heart and muscle disorders. Although not banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency, infusions of more than 50 millilitres in the space of six hours are prohibited.
According to The Sunday Times, the leaked documents contain emails from Salazar to disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong in 2011 in which the athletics coach boasts of the “incredible” performanceboosting effects of the substance, telling him to “call me asap! We have tested it and it’s amazing”.
The Usada report, written in March 2016 and leaked by Russian hackers Fancy Bears to The Sunday
Times, claims that Farah was given an infusion of L-carnitine by UK medical staff shortly before his London Marathon debut in 2014. The volume of that infusion is unknown. A UK Athletics spokesman said a “small number of British athletes” have used L-carnitine and “to our knowledge, all doses administered and methods of administration have been fully in accordance with Wada-approved protocol and guidelines”. The Usada report also contains numerous allegations of legal drug abuse, claiming that Salazar prescribed Farah high doses of vitamin D in an attempt to boost testosterone levels, only for John Rogers, a doctor attached to the British team, to intervene over concerns for the athlete’s health.
At least seven of Salazar’s runners are alleged to have been prescribed thyroid medication in another attempt to boost testosterone after joining the Nike Oregon Project, some of whom had no need for the medication. According to The Sunday Times, the report describes Salazar’s techniques as “potentially unlawful” and states they “came at the cost of substantial potential longterm health risks that were never fully or impartially explained”.
Salazar insisted he does not use banned substances and dismissed the latest claims as “recycled old allegations that have been refuted almost two years ago”. He also stated that any used of L-carnitine “was done so within Wada guidelines”.
The report – which Usada confirmed was a draft – has also raised serious questions for UK Athletics after the governing body gave Farah the all-clear to remain working with Salazar when allegations first emerged in June 2015. It is not known if any of the conclusions in the draft report are now out of date.
At the time Salazar denied all wrongdoing and UK Athletics stated it had “no reason to be concerned” about Farah’s association with his coach – a judgment it stood by last night.