I hope that someone can help me clear up a vicious sauna debate.
It relates to the romanian gymnast (whose name escapes me now) who had her gold medal stripped from her for failing a drug test for psuedo-ephidrine (how the hell do you spell that!?), supposedly from a Neurofen. Well, basically half of the people in sauna swore black and blue that this was most likely a load of crap. They were saying that psuedo-ephidrine is a masking drug, making you pass tests for another performance enhancing drug. What they were saying is that it would test positive in exactly the same way as a neurofen. Hence, her doctor did miscalculate when he gave it to her, as it must have been in too great a quantity, or too close to the test. BUT she was most likely on another performance enhancing drug which was being masked. Nurofen was used post-test as an excuse, just cause it sounds better than saying ‘well, actually I’m on other drugs I’m trying to cover up’. Does anyone know enough about these drugs to clear this up for me?
One last point looking at my packet of nuerofen, it doesn’t even have psuedo-ephidrine in it, it’s just a ibuprofen.
What the hell is with that?
PS I know jack about chemistry/performance-enhancing drugs, so excuse any bloody stupid elementary errors in here…
Well Andreea Raducan was stripped of her medal because she failed a drug test. She tested positive for pseudoephedrine, which she insists was in a cold remedy. Her doctor was expelled from the team following the test.
I believe that the story was that she took Sudafed, a cold medicine. The Sudafed contained some ingredients that triggers a positive for pseudoephedrine on a drug test. That’s why it is a banned substance in the Olympics. She tested negative in all the other times during the events, so the team was allowed to keep the all-around gold, and she kept her other medals. This was entirely the doctor’s fault for having her take that Sudafed, when the banned list was passed around for all to see.
Now there is huge fallout about all this. The head of the Romanian Sports Federation, who advocated a stringent anti-drug campaign, quit to avoid imposing a lifetime ban on the Andreea Raducan.
The whole thing struck me as a little odd. Even accepting that the drug she took would not enhance one’s gymnastics performance, it still leaves the question of why she took that drug in the first instance.
As an example, suppose that corn-containing substances are banned in the olympics. Even if corn has no effect on performance, you can imagine that any half-serious athlete would be very careful to eat say, wheaties instead of corn bran.
So the question is, why did the team doctor give the athlete “corn bran.” It would seem to be a serious lapse in judgment, at the very least.
I haven’t read all of the coverage, maybe the answer is there somewhere.
Pseudoephedrine hydrochloride is a central nervous system stimulant, as are drugs like bezedrine and methamphetamine. It is banned because of this effect.
It’s chemically related to adrenaline, which triggers the ‘flight or fight’ syndrome, part of which is constriction of small blood vessels (to minimize blood loss in case of injury and make more blood available to the big muscles for fighting or running). The constriction of the blood vessels also reduces nasal congestion, which is why it is used for colds and allergies.
I like pseudoephedrine hydrochloride for allergies because it doesn’t dope me out, but taking too much is like too much coffee, and for the same reasons. Buzzzzzzzzzz!
I never heard that it was a masking agent for other drugs. Lots of other athletes are being kicked out of the Olympics, not for taking steroids, but for taking drugs that will mask steroids. I think that is what got the Bulgarians in trouble at the 1996 Olympics.
The issue arises because testing technology has caught up with high tech doping. The East Germans could never get away with what they used to before the Wall fell.
You’d be amazed what athletes will do for a tiny extra edge. Ephedrine and pseudoephedrine are, as has been said before, stimulants, and one or the other is present in all those recent “Metabolife”-type weight-loss products. In gymnastics, losing a pound or two might add an inch or so to the height of your jumps, making it just a touch easier to nail your landings, or, if you’re light enough, add an extra rotation or half-twist.
Max, you are on the money. Fascinating article recently, printed during the run of the Tour De France in “The New Yorker”. Basically, it set out to show that ALMOST every world-class bicyclist uses enhancement. There is apparently at least one participant who does not use anything at all, and another biker was quoted as saying that while they respected his ethics, he’d never have a career at all as a result of LACK of doping.
Sad freaking day, I say. Almost enough to make me sell my Schwinn.
Is caffeine also a banned substance? I was wondering since rs0522 stated that pseudo-ephedrine had a similar effect.
If not caffeine, what about nicotine. Probably no sane serious athlete would smoke, but nicotine is a stimulant, one could just chew nicorette…
Essentially I’m wondering if stimulants which are in a wide variety of common drinks and foods today are banned as well.
Pseudoephedrine hydrochloride is a banned stimulant. It has nothing to do with being a masking agent.
It was totally her doctor’s fault. Even I know that Sudafed contains the banned substance.
You have to have a zero-tolerance policy or athletes will be claiming that their doctors told them to take it. I believe that she should have lost the medal; but it was her doctor’s fault, not hers. Unfair for her, but fair for everybody else. Her country should have had a better doctor.
Caffeine per se isn’t banned - and neither is pseudoephedrine for that matter. An athlete is prohibited from having an excessive amount of either of these
substances. A cup of coffee won’t get your gold medal snatched away from you. A caffeine suppository will.
Some of the problems with permissible levels and OTC meds are those of dose, body size, and hydration. A smaller athlete will end up with a higher serum
concentration of a given substance than a larger athlete. The same holds true for an athlete relatively more dehydrated - and a dehydrated athlete will also have more
concentrated urine, perhaps artificially elevating the concentration of the substance. The Romanian doc was an idiot, but…OTC meds are widely known to have
very low doses of the active ingredients. That is why they are deemed safe for sale without a prescription. He may have figured the cold medicine would help her
symptoms, allow her to rest more easily, and would not exceed the threshold. If she had been 15 lbs heavier he probably would have been right. I also read the
gymnast had trouble producing a sample; she was relatively dehydrated. Her urine was likely concentrated. Tough break for her. A few more cups of water during
the competition…who knows. While I agree in principle with the IOC’s stand on doping, and their zero-tolerance policy, Marion Jones could likely have taken the
same dose the same amount of time prior to testing, and been deemed clean… Bad example, with her husband’s controversy. Make that Cathy Freeman. You get
the idea.
Well, I haven’t seen any information about her questioning the doctor about the contents of the pill and him lying about it so I guess that makes it her fault as much as his.
Even though he is the team doctor and should have known, she is a world-class athlete and she should have known too since the loss is felt solely by her if something goes wrong. It is her responsibility to make sure that she is not ingesting any illegal substances. If anyone gives her medication, it is her duty to make sure that she knows exactly what is in that medication. Failure to take responsibility for your own well-being is wrong. She is just as guilty as her coach.
Using the Neurofen as a cover-up story for performance enhancers isn’t really plausible in my mind. I have no doubt that the whole debacle was just a blunder by the team doctor. She never has tested positive for anything (including at other tests during the Olympics) except this one time. I understand why the IOC took such a hard line stance but c’mon, there’s gotta be some loophole built into the rule to avoid messes like this in the future…Raducan gained no advantage from it, everyone acknowledges that. It was sudafed for christ’s sake.
By the way, she turned 17 last Saturday (Sep. 30).
Those of us in the heartland know that psuedoephidrene is one of the ingredients used to cook meth. Therefore it seems to me that, regardless of whether a cold capsule would give you an edge, the drug tests couldn’t tell one from the other and the athletes would claim they all just had runny noses.
One the later news reports on the psuedoephidrine affair stated that the athlete had three times the allowable limit of the drug on board. That’s not just an inadvertant error, that is either seriously slipshod medical advice, or blatant substance abuse. Clearly, her performance would have been slightly enhanced, even if only by the tiniest bit.
Also something to keep in mind. In many countries, if you want to be part of the team, be allowed access to training and equipment that you couldn’t recieve on your own, you probably are more inclined to do what your team doctor tells you. I mean, it the coach of the team tells you to act a certain way, or train with a certain method, and you refuse…would you still be on the team at the Olypics? How much lee-way do some of these athletes have? If you’re an up and coming athlete in a country where they tell you to take this “dietary supliment” do you refuse and hope that somehow you can get the training you need someplace else?
Not saying it’s right, but I do think it would be hard to refuse for some of these kids.
This seems to me to be analagous to the Pete Rose situation. Yes, it was against the rules. Yes, someone should have known better, but no harm, no foul.
Wrong!
It is drilled into the athletes heads that there are things you cannot, under any circumstances, do. These gymnasts have been intensive training and likely in special schools since they were barely out of diapers. They did not get noticed at some school meet at the age of 13 and asked to join the Olympic team. The doctor is the team doctor, not some dude who happened to do a good job curing the coaches STD. It is inconceivable that either the athlete or the doctor “made a mistake”. It is the medical equivalent of giving them a quart of whiskey the day of the competition to help with nerves.
Call the clue cab, everyone. This was doping to gain an advantage, nothing less.
Apologies in advance if this sounds obnoxious, but: Isn’t saying that like saying that aspirin contains some substances that strongly resemble acetylsalycilic acid?