Marion Jones tests positive

[Lefty]

http://www.cbs.sportsline.com/worldsports/story/9608722

 

[Russ Smith]

How dumb can she be? She's under intense scrutiny since the Balco mess and the whole Trevor Graham thing ongoing and she uses EPO at an event that it was well known would be testing for EPO?

Any guesses on what her excuse will be?

 

[Russ Smith]

Boy huge surprise, she says she's shocked at the test, has no idea how it happened, but her handlers say mistakes on EPO tests are quite common(not unheard of but not common). Her coach said she absolutely did not cheat(Steve Riddick) but then admitted he knew very little about EPO because its not something sprinters commonly use, it's more for endurance sports. Of course if Riddick would read his own comments from last year he'd see where he said the biggest problem jones was having was not because she'd been doping before and had quit, but because she'd given birth and coming back she had endurance problems that were really impacting her ability to train.

B sample is due to be tested Sept 3.

 

[thirty-two]

What a shame.

 

[Russ Smith]

And this case gets more and more like all the others. Marion says she didn't cheat, and is now saying only her lawyer is authorized to speak on her behalf. Why? Because Riddick came out yesterday and said there's a conspiracy to frame her for doping, why, because she's been under suspicion of doping for years and they just want to get her.

She has been tied to her ex husband's(CJ hunter) doping case, which introduced the world to one of his advisers, Victor Conte. Then Conte became the center of the Balco scandal, which implicated Jones. Among her coaches was Charlie Francis, the guy who gave steroids to Ben Johnson, and Trevor Graham, the guy banned from US track sites because so many of his athletes have failed drug tests. And let's not forget the father of Marion Jones baby, Tim Montgomery, serving a doping ban himself for his connections to Balco.

And yet we're supposed to believe Riddick's claim this is just a conspiracy?

One of the intriguing things is that someone interviewed by the SJ Mercury News about this case said that anybody who has seen the Balco testimonies knows that both Jones and Floyd Landis defense was totally discredited during that case. Landis said why would I use steroids, it doesn't help endurance athletes. Jones said why would I use EPO, it doesn't help sprinters.

Apparently during the Balco case sprinter Kellie White admitted under oath she'd used a variety of steroids, AND EPO, because EPO helps with endurance which allows a sprinter to train longer and harder. And in the same case we found out that Balco was giving "steroid patches" to endurance athletes because they helped them recover faster from long workouts. Which is precisely what Landis did when he had his famous "Bonk" at the TDF and then miraculously came back and made up like 8 minutes in one leg and won the whole event. The implication is that's likely what Landis used, a steroid patch like the ones Balco was giving out under Conte.

 

[clif]

Jones' 'B' sample comes back negative

Associated Press


The backup drug test for sprinter Marion Jones came back negative, clearing the five-time Olympic medalist of doping allegations that have dogged her for the past month, her attorneys said Wednesday night.
"I am absolutely ecstatic," Jones said in a statement released by her lawyers. "I have always maintained that I have never ever taken performance enhancing drugs, and I am pleased that a scientific process has now demonstrated that fact."
Jones tested positive for the banned endurance enhancer EPO on June 23. She withdrew from a meet in Switzerland hours before reports of the test result were revealed.
The backup test, conducted at the same UCLA lab using the same sample, came back negative, however, meaning the 30-year-old sprinter has been cleared of any wrongdoing. She faced a minimum two-year ban.
"I am anxious to get back on the track," Jones said.
The statement, released by attorney Rich Nichols, said the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency informed Jones that the test had come back negative. USADA does not comment on active cases and never acknowledged Jones' positive "A" test.
USADA general counsel Travis Tygart did not immediately return messages left late Wednesday by The Associated Press. U.S. Olympic Committee spokesman Darryl Seibel said the federation had no comment on the news.
Questions have long been raised about the reliability of EPO testing in the past, and this negative "B" test will spark further debate.
"I believe there are issues with that test," said Howard Jacobs, another Jones attorney who has defended several athletes on doping charges. "It's a difficult test. From what I saw on the "A' sample, it was questionable as to whether it should've been called a positive. I can't say I was shocked that the "B' came back negative based on what the "A' looked like."
As he has in the doping case involving Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, Jacobs derided the leaking of positive tests. Doping cases aren't supposed to be made public until they are resolved, but most become public through the media once a positive "A" test is confirmed.
"This is perfect illustration of why this new trend of leaking A-positives is a horrible thing," Jacobs said. "This whole thing should have happened anonymously. Marion should've been able to keep competing and no one should have known about it." Copyright 2006 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

 

[Russ Smith]

Yep I guess I owe Marion an apology on this one since it appears her first test results were so close they said many labs would have declared it negative. Apparently the B sample was similar but lower and thus negative.

 

[Dback Jon]

Yep I guess I owe Marion an apology on this one since it appears her first test results were so close they said many labs would have declared it negative. Apparently the B sample was similar but lower and thus negative.

It was a shame this info was not released when the initial test was released.

Glad Marion was cleared.

 

[Russ Smith]

It was a shame this info was not released when the initial test was released.

Glad Marion was cleared.

I guess I'm torn because I'm firmly convinced that she was very much involved in doping with balco and has simply gotten away with it because she didn't accept a banning like Kellie White or some of the others and for whatever reason they didn't pursue it. They have reams of documents that connect her to Balco, they have testimony from Victor Conte saying he personally injected her with steroids. There's just so much evidence that she doped there I just automatically assumed she'd done it this time too with the EPO.

She was the one in the Balco case that really bugged me the most, I was a big Bonds fan but the evidence was overwhelming. But with Jones I always felt like people were overlooking that she had a baby and that her post giving birth performance issues could very easily have been tied to that, not to drug use being stopped. There's also a lot of evidence that suggest it's damn near impossible for a woman using steroids and a man using steroids(Tim Montgomery) to have a baby because steroids often make male sperm not viable. So for a long time I was convinced she was innocent there until all the stuff started to leak out about testimony in the Balco case and it became pretty clear they had as much evidence against her as they did against Bonds.

 

[thirty-two]

Okay, I take back my "what a shame" statement and apply it towards the process of the A and B sample testing