Drug Testers Have Designs on New Steroid

Date: 08-03-2003 Posted by: Anabolic Info TeamGermany

The find was actually the second breakthrough for Catlin in a period of months. During the Salt Lake City Olympics last February, Catlin found the previously undetected darbepoetin -- a substance similar to the endurance enhancing erythropoietin (EPO) -- in samples of several cross-country skiers. Less than 5 percent of athletes in Olympic sports test positive for banned drugs.

USADA chief Terry Madden said a variety of information led drug-testing officials to believe that Arnold may have at one time made norbolethone.

Because USADA's information, which came largely from secondhand sources and the Internet, seemed to be beyond USADA's scope, officials said, they passed it on to federal investigators.

"When we find something this unusual . . . a designer drug, our interest is both in terms of getting through the case as a doping violation and also what the source might be," said Larry Bowers, USADA's senior managing director. "We have very limited capability to do investigations."

Arnold is believed to be the only prominent dietary supplement manufacturer in the United States who makes all of his own compounds, a distinction for which he claims credit. Others design their products but usually place orders for materials from manufacturers in China or Europe.

Anabolic steroids were made illegal in the United States for non-medical purposes after Congress heard testimony in the late 1980s about their potential ill effects and widespread abuse in sports. Thomas, who was also suspended for a year in 2000 after a series of urine tests showed a high testosterone-to-epitestosterone ratio, told The Post last summer that she had never taken anabolic steroids.

Thomas, 33, had risen through the ranks of track cycling in the 1990s but became a polarizing figure within the sport after her first positive test, which came just as she was about to face Olympic medalist Chris Witty in a ride-off for an Olympic team slot. Many cyclists were angry that Thomas negotiated a one-year suspension with USA Cycling and the U.S. Olympic Committee; a two- or four-year suspension for athletes accused of taking anabolic steroids is customary.

Thomas, listed at 5 feet 7, 159 pounds, won a silver medal at the World Track Cycling Championships in Antwerp, Belgium, in 2001. A three-sport athlete in high school, she took up cycling after her graduation from Mississippi State University in 1992.

When Thomas's ban was announced last summer, many riders and cycling officials who were skeptical of her achievements celebrated the news.

"When I saw her last, it was very obvious to me and others that she had gained upper body weight," said Pat McDonough, a coach at the Lehigh Valley Velodrome in Allentown, Pa. "There were pronounced differences in her physical appearance. . . . Her voice is deep, there's definitely facial hair, it's one of those things. If you look at a checklist of side effects [of steroids] and you just keep going down the list, you check all the boxes. . . . It's a shame about her personally, but it's very important for our sport to win a few of these battles and send some messages to people."

Catlin found norbolethone in two of Thomas's urine samples -- from March 2002 and August 2001.

After the first scan of the sample aroused suspicions, Catlin called for a more detailed scan that produced an unexpected peak that Catlin could not account for. A closer look at the results revealed the presence of metabolites similar but not identical to those produced by a known steroid known as norethandrolone.

Catlin put the test aside -- it was, after all, technically negative -- but began thumbing through old steroid manuals and textbooks to see if he could find a substance that might have yielded such an unusual result. He quickly focused his attention on norbolethone, as it was a close relative of norethandrolone and seemed to have the properties that would appeal to athletes seeking to gain strength.

After researching the history of norbolethone, Catlin wrote a letter to Wyeth, requesting a reference standard of the old drug -- which was essential to identify positively the substance in the urine sample.

After receiving the sample about two months later, Catlin used a mass spectrometer to compare the peaks in Thomas's urine sample with those produced by norbolethone. The results showed a match. Norbolethone was the mystery substance.

Thomas argued unsuccessfully at her hearing last summer that her positive tests for norbolethone were caused by using the Plan B emergency contraception levonorgestrel, which is a synthetic progestogen that happens to be similar chemically to norbolethone.

Thomas testified that she engaged in unprotected sex the day before each sample was taken and used the emergency birth control on the day of the unannounced drug tests. She told The Post last summer she could not afford daily birth control pills. She described herself as "a poor athlete."

On her drug-test disclosure form, she disclosed several vitamins and substances she had used, but did not mention the birth control. She said at her hearing that she considered the use of such medication a private matter.

The arbitration panel acknowledged there was a "theoretical possibility" that the birth control drug could have converted in the body to norbolethone but the defense was viewed as "inadequate" to explain the positive tests. "Levonorgestrel is a known artificial steroid with readily available markers that are easily seen" in drug screens, the court stated in its Sept. 6 opinion.

Gorden Hughes, one of the leaders of the team of scientists at Wyeth that studied norbolethone 40 years ago, said he didn't know why the steroid was never marketed. "It wasn't dropped for reasons of being poisonous or ineffective," he said during a phone interview from his home in Haverford, Pa. Published research on the steroid suggest it would be useful to athletes as its anabolic activity (muscle-building effects) is said to exceed its androgenic activity (negative side effects) by a factor of 20.

William Llewellyn, the author of "Anabolics 2002: Anabolic Steroid Reference Manual," said Catlin's discovery of norbolethone did not suggest that drug-testing officials could routinely foil athletes who attempt to disguise their use of performance-enhancing substances.

Designer steroids are "something that, if you really know the right person, you can get your hands on," Llewellyn said. "It's like a big community in all of the sports. Athletes who are taking performance-enhancing drugs can slip through the testing. . . . It's a largely accepted fact of competition that you can take certain drugs to get an edge. The Olympics is not even close to drug free. People on the inside know the truth."