‘no manipulation’ according to two new reports

The sample behind the positive control of Italian walker Alex Schwazer, suspended until 2024, “was not the subject of any manipulation” contrary to what an Italian judge had estimated, according to two new reports commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Athletics Federation.

«WADA and the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) of World Athletics have conducted further investigations which fully confirm their position that the sample taken on January 1, 2016 (…) did not object of no manipulation“, write the two organizations in a press release Thursday. The conclusions of these two new reports come a year after a judge in Bolzano (northern Italy) had pronounced a dismissal and estimated with “a high degree of credibility that the urine samples taken (…) were altered for the purpose of obtaining a positive result“, in order to “to obtain disqualification and discreditt” of the 2008 Olympic champion in the 50 km walk.

In an initial report commissioned by WADA, “Martial Saugy, an anti-doping scientist from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, (…) demonstrates that such a scenario is absolutely not plausible and is not supported by any analytical evidence“, argues the anti-doping authority.

The second study, conducted by a laboratory in Lausanne at the request of the IAU, which is based on “the analysis of DNA concentrations of one hundred samples from male endurance athletes», establishes that «the premise of the manipulation scenario is wrong“, she completes.

«The AMA has always maintained that the thesis of manipulation defended by the judge was not compatible with the facts”, declared its director general Olivier Niggli. The results (of both investigations) corroborate our position and completely invalidate Judge Pelino’s theory, which was based on several false assumptions.»

The eight-year suspension of Schwazer (37), who tested positive for anabolic steroids, was confirmed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) just before the 2016 Olympics. The samples taken on January 1, 2016 had initially given negative results but a new analysis, in May of the same year, had revealed traces of doping products.

World Athletics reiterated on Thursday that it “applied and will continue to apply the final CAS decision“. Schwazer had tested positive for the first time, at EPO, before the London Games in July 2012, and was then suspended for three years and nine months.