Olympic family proposes WADA take over testing (part II)

(Click here for part I)

Coe’s plans to enlarge testing pool is welcome

 It would indeed be a welcome step if the IAAF enlarges its testing pool internationally. Athletes from lower-rung countries like India either do not figure much of the time in the IAAF Registered Testing Pool (RTP) or else have only a token presence, say two or three athletes at a time in the pool.

If the IAAF includes those who make the ‘Olympic grade’ in the RTP that would make more sense. For example, from India only 800m runner Tintu Luka and triple jumper Arpinder Singh were in the RTP from September last year till now. There is no Indian athlete at the moment in the IAAF RTP. There are a dozen athletes who have made the ‘cut’ for Rio so far.

Enlarging that pool would thus be extremely beneficial especially for countries that do have a doping problem but may not be having athletes who are ranked high enough to merit attention from an international anti-doping agency.

But Coe has also talked about “national testing programmes” and “swifter management of results.”

That part, one thought, was under the domain of the NADOs. At least in countries where a NADO is in existence that responsibility is that of NADO. The ‘results management’ is also the responsibility of the NADO since it happens to be the ‘testing authority’. The National Federation can at best try to co-ordinate efforts, by informing the NADO of its calendar, alerting it about an ensuing meet well in time, advising it about the competitions at the junior level that could be brought under doping control, helping NADO in preparing a domestic RTP and organising educational programmes etc.

Eventually, the test distribution plan has to be the responsibility of the NADO.

Hearing process

The hearing process is done by ‘independent’ panels. From country to country, from case to case, the time taken to resolve a doping case differs. In India, for example, the 11 cases involving methylhexaneamine (MHA) use, which started in 2010, took more than four years to come to a conclusion including an appeal stage. One of the cases still went to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and it took a few more months to resolve.

This is an extreme example but it is mentioned here to prove the point that a National Federation can do little when this type of delay occurs.

There were two cases of track and field athletes in that batch of 11. The National federation had no role to play. It did not even attend the hearings. WADA could have stepped in and asked for a speedier resolution, failing which it could have dragged the cases straight to CAS. But it did not.

The NADA’s revised rules have provisions for speedier resolution of doping cases. We will have to see how it works in the longer run.

Coming back to Coe’s attempts to install an independent agency and to help National Federations speed up things, one way could be for the IAAF to take over the responsibility of  hearing all cases of ‘international-level’ athletes. This would include those athletes who are in the IAAF Registered Pool and those who compete in ‘international meets’ designated for this purpose in advance by the IAAF.

At the moment the IAAF does not have any mechanism to hear any doping case, international-level or otherwise. All cases have to be handled by the National Federations and in most instances the latter delegate the authority to the NADOs.

What the Code says

The National Federations in fact have no defined role to play in testing and ‘results management’ as per the WADA Code.

The Code says:

“5.2.1 Each National Anti-Doping Organization shall have In-Competition and Out-of-Competition Testing authority over all Athletes who are nationals, residents, license-holders or members of sport organizations of that country or who are present in that National Anti-Doping Organization’s country.

“5.2.2 Each International Federation shall have In-Competition and Out-of-Competition Testing authority over all Athletes who are subject to its rules, including those who participate in International Events or who participate in Events governed by the rules of that International Federation, or who are members or licence-holders of that International Federation or its member National Federations, or their members.”

The major event organisations (for example the IOC) have the authority to do ‘in-competition’ testing. There is no mention of National Federation when it comes to testing authority.

As for the disciplinary process, as an example, this is what the USATF has to tell its athletes:

“USADA handles all aspects of the disciplinary process if a sample tests positive either domestically or internationally. If the positive sample was given in a domestic competition sanctioned by USATF, USADA will notify the athlete of the test result. If the positive sample was given in an IAAF-sanctioned competition, the IAAF will notify USATF, and USATF will notify the athlete and inform USADA, which will handle the remainder of the process.”

It is of course unimaginable that Coe would be hinting at establishing an independent agency for athletics, “moving away from links with WADA’ as this report suggests.

It would further erode the credibility of the IAAF anti-doping system if it were to move away from the monitoring clutches of WADA.

WADA’s task

How can WADA go about the task of becoming a testing agency for all sports if it finally takes up the challenge?

Ideally, WADA would do well to pick only Olympic sports to begin with. And again, it would be wise to concentrate on out-of-competition testing, leaving ‘in-competition’ testing to the International Federations or else do ‘in-competition’ testing only in major events while doing out-of-competition testing at all levels.

After all, in 14 editions of the IAAF World Championships since 1983 and up to 2013, only 52 positive cases were reported from 10,787 samples (0.48 %).

Priority sports disciplines for testing could be worked out in consultation with the IOC. For example, the perennial ‘doping disciplines’, weightlifting, athletics and cycling could be given top priority with swimming, wrestling and boxing to follow.

National-level testing will necessarily have to be done by the NADOs since the numbers are too large for WADA to handle. (In 2014, WADA-accredited laboratories tested a total of 1,86,723 samples in Olympic sport disciplines alone. NADOs tested 1,43,095 out of a total of 2,17,762 samples that excluded non-ADAMS data)

The hearing process will also have to be managed by NADOs where they have the authority and by International Federations where ‘international-level’ athletes are involved. The IAAF can join this ‘community’ by bringing anti-doping rule violation cases involving ‘international-level’ athletes before its panels for resolution, deviating from its current practice of holding no hearings at all.

IOC needs to expand testing period

There are only 10 months left for Rio Olympics. If WADA has to take over  testing and it is going to take too long a time for it to be effective, the IOC may have to put in place a testing regimen that is more robust than in the past. Not in terms of testing during the Olympics, which can of course be entrusted to WADA, but in the run-up to the Olympics.

The IOC normally is in charge of doping control during the “period of the Olympic Games”. And this period usually begins on the date of the opening of the ‘Games village’ and ends with the closing ceremony. This period is considered as ‘in-competition’.

This period should ideally be extended, rather advanced to include at least two months prior to the ‘in-competition’ period for out-of-competition testing by the IOC if not in all sports at least in such vulnerable sports as weightlifting, athletics, cycling etc.

Everyone keeps talking of ‘zero tolerance’ towards doping: everyone knows a large number of athletes are doping, will continue to dope and will do everything possible to avoid detection prior to the Olympic Games.

Costs should then be no consideration for the Thomas Bach-headed IOC to mount a no-holds-barred attack on the cheats in the run-up to Rio. This may yet not deter the ‘hard-core’dopers or the ones who get a regular supply of designer steroids or the ones who micro-dose to such perfection that their EPO use goes undetected. But it could be worth a try when an all-out effort seems be developing towards cleaning up Olympic sports.

WADA has an onerous task before it. Bach and Coe could be expected to fully back it in the coming months. And you need a man like David Howman, the non-nonsense WADA Director-General, to continue to hold onto the vital controls in Montreal.

(concluded)