BY DR RACHEL IRVING

TYSON Gay was originally the poster boy for anti-doping

in America.

He had done an advertisement to the effect that his mom would kill him if she found out he had taken any performance enhancer. Between May and June 2013, Gay returned multiple adverse analytical findings for samples taken both in and out of completion.

It has been reported that he used steroidal cream containing testosterone and Human Growth Hormone (HGH) given to him by an anti-aging specialist. It is said that the label on the cream indicated that it was 100 per cent natural. America and the rest of the world were stunned in the wake of those developments.

Gay and his team realised much was at stake and started immediate damage control.

The Jamaican athletes must become aware of what they need to do if they inadvertently encounter performance enhancing drugs and become contaminated.

The sprint factory and its progenies have to understand the criteria that are required to stay clean in the minefield of the doping world, and if they are inadvertently affected, how to minimise their sanction by effectively showing that they had no intention of cheating.

It is painful to see little or no reduction in sanctions because a Jamaican athlete and legal team have not drawn on the relevant article in the WADA Code, reinforced by cogent scientific data that would mitigate the sanction. Where and how did Tyson Gay get it right? The sanction to date for a first- time offender using a performance enhancing drug is usually two years.

Persons sanctioned for stimulant usage depending on the no fault or negligence subsection 10.5.2 of the WADA Code usually gets a minimum of a public warming up to a maximum of two years. The onus is usually on the athlete to prove no negligence or fault by showing that he/she did all the checks and balances to uphold the ethics of clean competition.

Persons using anabolic steroids on the other hand usually get the maximum sanction of two years and sometimes get up to four years if the case is deemed aggravated. How did Tyson Gay escape the maximum sanction?

Immediately as it became public that Gay was sanctioned for PEDs, he publicly accepted responsibility not for cheating but that the test results were his. He also withdrew himself from further competition and cooperated fully with the United States Anti-doping Agency (USADA).

Gay and his team were well aware that it was subsection 10.5.3 of the WADA Code that they would be targeting. So as required in subsection 10.5.3 he took himself away from a severe sanction by announcing to the world that he was taking full responsibility, showing WADA that he understood the Strict Liability Clause and was adhering to it.

He also showed penitence by saying he was immediately suspending himself (self imposed provisional suspension). Technically without saying it, he implied succinctly that he should be considered for a reduced sentence because he was going to cooperate fully with USADA by telling them everything about what he took and who mislabelled or aided him into taking the banned substances.

This stepwise behaviour immediately put him in arm’s reach of getting a minimum of six months. Part of subsection 10.5.3 of the WADA Code states, “The extent to which the otherwise applicable period of ineligibility may be suspended shall be based on the seriousness of the anti-doping rule violation committed by the athlete or other person and the significance of

the substantial assistance provided by the athlete to

the effort to eliminate doping in sport. No more than

three-quarters of the otherwise applicable period of ineligibility may be suspended.”

USADA, the anti-doping agency with responsibility for anti-doping violation of American athletes, suspended a part of the ineligibility because Gay provided substantial assistance which resulted in the anti-doping agency initiating charges against the persons who prescribed him the anti-aging cream.

Factors USADA considered in deciding Gay’s level of assistance in the anti-doping matter, and how many months should be extracted from his sanction period, were the status of the individual who gave him the anti-aging cream, whether a scheme involving administration of drug by associates under subsection 2.8 of the Code was enacted and whether the violation involved a substance or method which was not readily detectible in testing.

This is why Gay gave back his silver medal from the London 2012 Olympics. He is in fact implying that he was using the cream from around London 2012 just after his hip reduction operation and although he tested negative then, the cream might have been contaminated from then with undetectable levels of steroids and therefore all medals/awards should be returned.

Some people argue that this puts Gay in a good light because he has in fact voluntarily started his sanction from just before the London Olympics in 2012 and therefore has got technically two years even though in the USADA’s books, his sanction started from June 23, 2013 and ends on June 22, 2014, which is in fact 12 months. USADA could not have given Tyson less than one year although subsection 10.5.3 facilitates a minimum of six months because Gay inadvertently or advertently used steroids multiple times.

I wish Sherone Simpson and Asafa Powell luck with their appeals to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. I do, however, hope that they and their lawyers read and analyse the WADA Code in respect to supplements to effectively argue their cases for a meaningful reduction in sanction. It can be done, but they and their team must put up a better defence of

their integrity.

Editor’s note: Dr Rachel Irving is the Senior Research Fellow in the Faculty of Medical Sciences at the University of the West Indies, Mona.