SALT LAKE CITY, Feb. 24 -- In a historic and resounding anti-doping decision, the International Olympic Committee today stripped a gold medal each from two athletes and expelled three in all for using a previously undetectable drug that boosts endurance.
In only the second Games in which the IOC has employed a test for drugs that increase the production of oxygen-carrying red blood cells, the IOC rescinded the most recent gold medals won by cross-country skiers Larissa Lazutina of Russia and Johann Muehlegg of Spain.
Russia's Larissa Lazutina, whose gold medal in the 30-kilometer women's cross country race was stripped for testing positive for a endurance enhancing drug, shies away from reporters Sunday.
(Luca Bruno - AP)
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The IOC announced that they and another cross-country skier, Olga Danilova of Russia, tested positive for darbepoetin, which is a drug with a similar molecular structure and function to the more commonly recognized erythropoietin (EPO), which has long been believed to be a favorite of distance athletes. All of the positive tests resulted from out-of-competition tests administered Thursday.
Darbepoetin, available by prescription in the United States since last September, is so new that it isn't even on the IOC's banned drug list. The IOC justified its action today by citing a clause in its anti-doping code that encompasses substances closely related to banned drugs.
Endurance-aiding drugs have long been considered the bane of distance sports such as cross-country skiing and cycling. Prior to the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney, the IOC had no way to detect such drugs, leading to the belief that they were widely abused. Blood tests routinely used by the international cycling and skiing federations can not detect EPO or darbepoetin itself; the tests can only measure elevated blood levels and raise suspicion of drug use.
The positive tests announced here today provide the first substantive evidence that the test is more than a threat. The combined blood-and-urine test turned up no positives in Sydney.
IOC Medical Commission Chairman Arne Ljunqvist said the expulsions prove that the IOC is keeping pace with even the newest drugs on the market.
Ljunqvist said the positive results send "a very important message" to athletes who use performance-enhancing drugs. "We are on their heels," he said. "We have one of the most modern labs in the world working well."
The results analysis was conducted in an IOC-accredited laboratory that was set up in Salt Lake City for these Games.
Lazutina was forced to relinquish the medal she won in the 30-kilometer classical race, but she was allowed to keep the silvers she won earlier in the 15K freestyle and 10K combined. The 30K medal had been her 10th, tying the women's Winter Games record.
Muehlegg was asked to return his gold from the 50K classical race, but he was allowed to keep his golds in the 30K freestyle and 10K pursuit. Danilova will keep her earlier gold and silver medals. She finished eighth in the 30K classical event from which she was disqualified.
"I don't understand this result," Muehlegg said in a Spanish radio interview, according to the Associated Press. "I've been skiing for 10 years in World Cups and I've been through 25 controls, and there's never been a problem."
Said Lazutina, before the results of her test had been confirmed: "For many years, I've been taking this blood test and I've never had problems. I put it down to female physiology. . . . Sometimes we feel like we are criminals."
The IOC said it could not deprive the athletes of their earlier victories because the positive test came after those results, and it could not be proved that they had benefited from the drugs prior to the tests.
But, IOC President Jacques Rogge said today, "technically, they are Olympic champions. Morally, it is a different issue."
Darbepoetin is made by the U.S. company Amgen Corp. and is prescribed under the name Aranesp. It was approved by the Food and Drug Administration last fall. It is intended to prevent anemia in patients with chronic kidney failure.
The IOC recommended that the International Skiing Federation take further action against the athletes.
