The Meldonium Mess

I think a key word here is "unexcused". Probably for an athlete without a reputation for ducking scheduled drug tests, a reasonable explanation excusing his absence is probably going to be sufficient. On the other hand, is an injury really a great excuse for missing a pre-scheduled drug test? Don't injured athletes normally show up for school events even when they are on crutches? In many industries, manufacturing processes are imprecise and defects arrive without the occurrence of fault, particularly when the processes are new and characterization is incomplete. Software defects on the other hand, are largely the fault of folks dealing inadequately with complexity and of course it is important to strive to eliminate bugs. Some of that elimination comes for things like unit testing and integration testing, code inspections, etc, during the process.In the semiconductor industry, for example, often the best that can be done with new processes is to get the defect rate down to a manageable level and then do test/discard on individual ICs. Yield numbers in the area of 60% for very large circuits are not unusual. Some of the alternatives, such as adding redundancy or self correction add to energy consumption and delay.It would be great if athletes were not under pressure to look for an edge, but the reality is that in some sports, short cuts are extremely attractive, and can pay huge returns for those that get away with it. I don't believe it is possible to design in drug "freeness" in the face of folks deliberately pursing an edge that might land them fame, money, etc."You should call USADA's Drug Reference Hotline at 800-233-0393 to find out the current status of any substance you may consider taking."I suppose world class athletes had best take that advice seriously. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : Insert word yield.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Yes, reasonable explanations have been so effective for athletes. That wasn't about a "pre-scheduled drug test." I explained the scenario: I also mentioned the "daily 60-minute window" in one of the excerpts I provided.--Percy

We are talking about a test during a scheduled time period, and supposedly an injury or some other understandable reason prevented attendance. You appear to be speculating that an athlete being somewhere else, maybe due to injury provides some risk, and your later suggest that it is not reasonable that the athletes excuse would be accepted. You have suggest that the above represents some unfair burden to the athlete, but it does not seem as if the burden is all that difficult to meet unless an excuse is something hard to come by, submit, and have accepted. Are you aware of instances where an injured athlete missed a test because he got hurt and some testing agency then sanctioned the athlete? If not then why shouldn't I consider your worry about a burden to the athlete to be mere idle speculation.How would you run a drug testing program so that it 1) does not burden athletes "excessively" and so that 2) the program details are not merely a blueprint for how to evade testing?Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

No one would think your phrase "pre-scheduled drug test" refers to the 60-minute daily window. World-class athletes must submit this information each quarter for each and every day of that quarter for the purpose of establishing their availability for out-of-competition tests. Athletes rightfully complain that this is an undue and unfair burden. I was trying to make this more clear by describing how easily and unintentionally an athlete might miss a 60-minute window. My example was a hypothetical trying to make the problem more clear to you. But are you arguing that because the level of detail of my knowledge can go only so far that therefore it doesn't happen? Do you think that composing unanswerable detailed questions is an argument? You've already asked this question and the answer hasn't changed. This is a very difficult problem with no easy solutions, but just saying, "Let's put all the burden on the athletes," is not a fair answer.--Percy

You quoted a policy under which an unexcused absence could result in a suspension and appeared to consider that to be problematic because tests could be missed by some particular situations you described. I stated the obvious or something which should have been obvious; namely that whether or not that policy was problematic depended on whether excuses were difficult to come by.It turns out that actually have no idea about whether athletes can simply tell why their plans changed for the day and thus escape punishment. It would appear that there is no way to evaluate whether the policy is either problematic or burdensome. You cannot even tell me how that missed testing problem is handled now. Maybe the tester, after missing the athlete, spends time trying to follow up until he gets an acceptable answer from the athlete and his coach. I can't even get you to show me an unfair burden on the athlete for most of the problems I've tried to dig into. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Given the refusal of WADA and national sports federations to accept any excuse for a failed test, the same strict approach would be expected for 60-minute window failures, would it not? You have no grounds for thinking they're pussycats when it comes to missed tests. I'll investigate for you anyway.The details of the rules regarding the 60-minute window can be found here: WADA Announces Significant Changes to Code. It says that 3 Whereabouts Failures (failure to file paperwork or missing the 60-minute window) in 18 months is "subject to one of more of the following: disqualification, ineligibility, or a provisional suspension."And here's a list of Sanctions from the USADA going back to 2001. All the Whereabouts Failures are after 2010 because the rules only began in 2008. Some names are familiar (Lance Armstrong), most are not. Naturally this list includes only US athletes. Each country would have their own list. On this US list there are 16 athletes with Whereabouts Failures resulting in suspensions for 1 to 2 years, and 5 athletes with Missed Tests resulting in either ineligibility (1) or suspension (4).This means that it is not easy to find acceptable excuses for Whereabouts Failures and Missed 60-minute windows. So you're wrong again. If next you ask how many athletes successfully provided excuses then I will grant your ability to ask questions for which no publicly available data exists.You could look this stuff up yourself before going off on flights of fancy. In both the Deflategate thread and this one, you're getting all your information from me, but you could find this information yourself, or in many cases just read the links I provide. This isn't discussion. This is like facing a wannabe courtroom lawyer who is asking as many insinuating questions as possible and hoping something sticks. You don't have an actual position, just a hope to find things wrong.The burdens placed on the athletes by WADA look substantial and unfair to me. Many athletes think so, too. I've detailed a number of the reasons. If you disagree then you need your own positive reasons, not just expressions of accusatory skepticism.--Percy

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And here's a list of Sanctions from the USADA going back to 2001. All the Whereabouts Failures are after 2010 because the rules only began in 2008. Some names are familiar (Lance Armstrong), most are not. Naturally this list includes only US athletes. Each country would have their own list. On this US list there are 16 athletes with Whereabouts Failures resulting in suspensions for 1 to 2 years, and 5 athletes with Missed Tests resulting in either ineligibility (1) or suspension (4).

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This means that it is not easy to find acceptable excuses for Whereabouts Failures and Missed 60-minute windows. So you're wrong again. If next you ask how many athletes successfully provided excuses then I will grant your ability to ask questions for which no publicly available data exists.

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Percy, if you look at a list of sanctions you will only see the athletes who were sanctioned, not those who were able to escape sanctions. So that data doesn't - and cannot - show how easy it is to provide excuses for whereabouts failures.I note also that it seems to take 3 whereabouts failures for sanctions to be triggered, so obviously athletes can get away with one or two.

Whoa, brother. I have no grounds for reaching any conclusion, and I have not done so. I've just asked some pointed, but reasonable questions of you regarding how you reached your own conclusions. Are you suggesting that I should simply take your word for things, when you haven't researched them either? Why should I do that? Again, I've just asked you some questions. I have not made any claims, or gone off on any flights of fancy. I agree with PaulK's assessment of the evidence. You have not shown how easy or difficult it is to find acceptable excuses. All we know is that 21 such attempts were not successful. If it turns out that you are right about the difficulty of offering excuses then you've addressed my question. At this point, I don't think I'm in any position to be right or wrong to ask for evidence. At the time I asked the question, I'd have been happy to hear even anecdotes of students saying, I offered excuse X and got burned. But so far, we just have a relatively small number, less than 0.5 athletes per state, who have gotten caught up in the failure to provide an accepted excuse over some period of time. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Sharapova's two year drug suspension has been reduced to 15 months upon appeal. The Court of Arbitration for Sport's 28-page decision said that Sharapova was at "no significant fault" and that "...under no circumstances ... can the player be considered to be an 'intentional' doper." Sharapova can return to tournament play in April of next year.In other news, defensive lineman Rob Ninkovich returned to the New England Patriots today after serving his 4-week PED (Performance Enhancing Drug) suspension.--Percy

Percy parenthetically writes: Jeez, Percy...talk about playing it down.Hello, who ELSE returned to the Patriots line up today???Hello? 33-13? 3 touchdown passes, 406 yards???? Hello?LOLEdited by xongsmith, : my scoreboard wasn't updated yet

I mentioned Ninkovich because of the disparity in the length of suspensions for drug use.--Percy

Ray Rice received a two game suspension after knocking his wife unconscious. I understand the sentiment that Sharapova's suspension is too long. But the NFL's system of punishment is a joke.

It shouldn't pass without notice that Sharapova returned to tournament play a couple weeks ago at Stuttgart where she reached the semifinals. She's playing at the Italian Open in Rome this week. She's submitted applications for wild-card entries into the French Open and Wimbledon while she rebuilds her ranking. Without wild-card entries she will have to go through qualifying.--Percy

FYI, she has been barred from the French Open:Maria Sharapova denied opportunity to qualify for French OpenSacre bleu!

Interesting. Since the Court of Arbitration for Sport is the ultimate authority, I'm not sure they can do that. There may be work for lawyers here, but I'm not sure. The Grand Slams have a great deal of autonomy when it comes to deciding about wildcard entries, even to qualifying.--Percy