shelby houlihan report - lrc journalists - pls chase

Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

- The realities of nandrolone being used as a growth enhancer for pigs (the only way that nandrolone even gets into this equation to begin with). 1) It's outlawed in the United States of America. 2) If you then want to clutch a straw and say "well it could have come from Mexico" - it's virtually inconceivable that in Mexico they would use expensive nandrolone to feed pigs for food purposes and even then, this was right at the height of Covid (1.0) mania which had been going on for at least 8 months and import/export of food into the US was highly regulated.

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This keeps coming up and I don’t get why …

Why is anyone talking about “nandrolone being used as a growth enhancer for pigs” or even “it could have come from Mexico”.

We are talking about American pigs, not enhanced with nandrolone, but lucky enough that the farmer didn’t castrate them. If you consume uncastrated male pork meat, and particularly some of the organs, you can easily violate the 5 ng/ml limit — as much as 160 ng/ml has been observed (IIRC, I’d have to search back for the right reference), so it is not necessary to eat 12 ounces to reach 5 ng/ml.

rekrunner wrote: If you consume uncastrated male pork meat, and particularly some of the organs, you can easily violate the 5 ng/ml limit — as much as 160 ng/ml has been observed (IIRC, I’d have to search back for the right reference), so it is not necessary to eat 12 ounces to reach 5 ng/ml.

I think the 160 ng/ml is a copy/paste error. See Stitchmo's paper.

Because it's another way that increased levels of nandrolone could be present in the organs of pigs which could logically decrease the amount of "tissue" needed to be consumed. Why this could be important/relevant is below

The document you are referencing those numbers from is (possibly) the one I linked earlier and this is the paragraph you are referencing:

19‐nortestosterone, the 17β‐isomer, is present in the intact boar. A first report described the ingestion of a substantial amount of non‐castrated pig meat (375 g) resulting in the excretion of 19‐norandrosterone in amounts reaching 3–7.5 ppb in the following hours.(69) Another study confirmed that in spite of interindividual differences, 19‐NA and 19‐NE were always measured in specimens provided in the hours following the improbable ingestion (non‐castrated pig meat being difficult to find) of such meat‐rich meal composed of non‐castrated pig tissues, with levels even reaching 160 ng/ml in one case. No trace of norsteroid metabolites was found in urine samples collected before or after the ingestion of castrated pig edible parts. As expected, the GC/C/IRMS analysis confirmed endogenous‐like 13C/12C value of metabolites.(70)

The numbers 69 and 70 in brackets, are the links to the referenced papers used in the one I previously attached. In the first instance (art.69) the amount of non-castrated Boar tissue/meat is 375g creating the levels of 3-7.5ppb. In the second instance (art.70) aka the "other study", you can go to this paper and see that control amount of non-castrated Boar tissue/meat used was 310g. That is 13 and 11 ounces respectively which is a massive, almost disgusting amount of food (especially as it only constitutes around half a burrito at best). No offence intended here at all but it kind of is necessary to consume this much meat/tissue/organ for these numbers to occur because this is what the peer-reviewed study/science tells us.

And at a guess I would say that the CAS probably looked at these very type of articles when determining if they believed this account or not. Look, if you can find out where what I said above is wrong (it would be an issue of me getting confused about the numbers etc which is possible, even though I re-read this a few times to make sure I wasn't getting it wrong) then I am happy to be corrected. To me though the very fact that we are getting into this discussion and trying to assess absolute outlier situations and upper limits of plausibility show that the story she put up was effective to some degree in creating enough plausible smoke and mirrors.

It still seems like you didn’t understand what I wrote. Let’s pretend hypothetically that Houlihan ordered a carne asada burrito, with a receipt to prove it, and by accident ate a boar stomach burrito, with no way to prove it was accidental. Show me the WADA rules that distinguish that, and treats it separately and differently from, say, Russian women before Russia was banned.

As for “synthetic nandrolone”:

a) I know that. For some reason you still defended it.

b) Yes. WADA considers boar meat consumption “endogenous”, and did so in 2019, and now requires the labs to follow a different process when reporting results. Did you also notice that WADA also redefines “intentional” to be broader?

c) I did not make a point about the letter of the rules as they stood in January, but about whether WADA rules deliver “justice” for athletes, or whether Tygart is right, and these rules need to be reformed. The recent rule changes only reinforce that the previous standards were not “just”.

op here.

the whole point of this thread is to have the report publsihed so that we can put this speculation to bed.

presumably all these arguments were presented by the nike lawyers and cast aside.

that is why we need the report to be published.

and if the report doesnt establish that, then we are in trouble.

the story, for this thread, is not the speculation about the details about shelby, it is about the fact that the sporting establishment allows, nay even encourages such speculation, by avoiding essential transparency.

and shining this light is the raison d'etre of journalists in the face of a corrupt system (hi seb).

rekrunner wrote:

It still seems like you didn’t understand what I wrote. Let’s pretend hypothetically that Houlihan ordered a carne asada burrito, with a receipt to prove it, and by accident ate a boar stomach burrito, with no way to prove it was accidental.

Now that I understand. You are concerned with a hypothetical case where the athlete got their steroids accidentally from a boar, and the anti-doping agency erroneously prosecuted them for intentional doping.

That of course has very little to do with "rules that treat accidental ingestion from publicly available food the same as taking an explicitly banned drug with the express intent of gaining performance".

In fact, the rules explicitly allow for a zero ban for "accidental ingestion from publicly available food" (Wilson for example) versus a standard four year ban for "taking an explicitly banned drug".

Indeed "the express intent of gaining performance" is not relevant for the four year ban.

But Houlihan’s team did not claim to have eaten pigs illegally enhanced with nandrolone, or pigs imported from Mexico. That’s the par that I mostly don’t get. It’s like you are trying to debunk something that was never claimed.

And you found my source, and even quoted it: “with levels even reaching 160 ng/ml in one case”. I’m wondering how much meat produced 160 ng/ml in that one case, and what quantity of organ meat is really necessary to produce just 5 ng/ml? Your 13 and 11 ounces shrinks to as little as 0.4 and 0.35 ounces, or 10-11 grams — not a very massive quantity at all. But maybe I’m wrong and 160 ng/ml means something else. I suppose the issue with your science is that the sample size in (69) and (70) is too small to be able to generalize.

rekrunner wrote:And you found my source, and even quoted it: “with levels even reaching 160 ng/ml in one case”. I’m wondering how much meat produced 160 ng/ml in that one case

Oh rekrunner...

As I told you above, there is a slight problem (actually two) with that 160. Read the original source. It's actually 16.0 ng/ml clostebol acetate (see Table 3), not 160 ng/ml nandrolone. Nandrolone is for example in Table 1, up to 3.79 ng/ml.

Almost.

More specifically, I’m talking about the accidental ingestor who is unable to meet the burden of “strict liability”.

Wilson could meet this burden, so is not really any part of this scenario.

To take away the hypothetical, recall again the real scenario in the latest Seppelt documentary where the German athlete took prescribed tablets that, unknown to him, were contaminated with a banned substance.

By luck, he had one tablet left that was tested and found to be contaminated, and was exonerated, just like Wilson. Without that tablet, he cannot meet the burden of “strict liability”, and would get the full ban, just like any real doper — because the rules don’t distinguish between this accidental contamination, and the case of genuine doping intended to enhance performance.

Yet even though the German athlete was able to clear his name, it came at great personal legal and scientific expense, and all the while, he was forbidden to compete, and earn money — money that would have helped fund legal and scientific fees.

Again — the real point is “justice” — it shouldn’t depend on the fortune of having one table left to be tested, to see which rules get applied. Even successfully clearing his name involved a significant amount of injustice.

No mate - don't spin words to suit your agenda.

I never claimed this was a defense of Houlihans team - nor did anybody. All it is is an exploration of every avenue as to how she ate an amount of freaking pork offal (which I even feel stupid writing this because she didn't) so small that gave her an amount of banned substance in her body that got her banned. It's not about debunking something never claimed it's about objectively looking at every possible avenue that might pertain to her innocence. So okay, since it's a non-issue lets put it to bed and just focus on what we do know.

"I’m wondering how much meat produced 160 ng/ml in that one case, and what quantity of organ meat is really necessary to produce just 5 ng/ml? Your 13 and 11 ounces shrinks to as little as 0.4 and 0.35 ounces, or 10-11 grams — not a very massive quantity at all."

Huh? Dude the articles tell us (?!?!) You understand that in these kinds of experiments, things like the control amount don't change throughout. right? They don't start with "Three male volunteers agreed to consume 310 g of tissues from the edible parts...." give a result and then give another number (in this case the 160 ng/ml) to which the control amount changes?!?! The amount of tissue that gave in one case this extreme outlier number was 310g. This is not implausible - they take measurements over the course of multiple hours which obviously fluctuate and it is possible that there are interpersonal spikes dependent on the individual.

Is it possible that Houlihan was one such individual? Okay let's assume she was - she still needs to eat a massive quantity of this sh$t and even then we need to get past the whole "I ordered something but was given something else that I've never had before and that something else tastes like garbage" ruse.

You can choose to believe this and then the probability that whatever amount it was was very substantial and then choose to believe she could be an extremely unlucky outlier. The AIU and the CAS didn't and I'm on their side so I guess that's just too bad for you and Shelby huh.

casual obsever wrote:

rekrunner wrote:And you found my source, and even quoted it: “with levels even reaching 160 ng/ml in one case”. I’m wondering how much meat produced 160 ng/ml in that one case

Oh rekrunner...

As I told you above, there is a slight problem (actually two) with that 160. Read the original source. It's actually 16.0 ng/ml clostebol acetate (see Table 3), not 160 ng/ml nandrolone. Nandrolone is for example in Table 1, up to 3.79 ng/ml.

The paper says “19‐NA and 19‐NE” and “160” not “16.0” or “clostebol acetate”.

If that doesn’t match the original source, that is a problem.

[quote]Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

No mate - don't spin words to suit your agenda.

I never claimed this was a defense of Houlihans team - nor did anybody. All it is is an exploration of every avenue…/quote]

I think I misunderstood why you included “nandrolone being used as a growth enhancer for pigs” and talked about that being illegal in the US, or getting meat from Mexico, in the scope of “scratching the surface” and “debunking her story”.

If you don’t claim that is part of “Her easy to debunk story”, and it is just an “exploration of every avenue”, it makes more sense.

Regarding your science, I still think the sample size is too small to make generalizations about the amount of meat required. I’m also wondering how her likely smaller body mass figures into it.

But if “casual” is right, and the original source says 16.0 ng/ml clostebol acetate, it hardly makes sense to discuss it further.

rekrunner wrote:

Regarding your science, I still think the sample size is too small to make generalizations about the amount of meat required. I’m also wondering how her likely smaller body mass figures into it.

Buddy - it's not my science. And it's not a generalization - go read the abstract and if you have take issue with the method talk to B Le Bizec, I Gaudin, F Monteau, F Andre, S Impens, K De Wasch, H De Brabander - they are the authors.

I'll reiterate - you do realize how all these layers of "sample sizes" and "likely body mass figures" all factor into exactly what this excuse aims to do right? If you can extract enough (im)plausible perspectives from the reasoning it is all by design to promote the "yeah but what if" attempt at innocence. Don't be fooled.

Somebody could have put a CERA-soaked tampon up Ramzi's rectum while he was sleeping. That doesn't mean it's a likely explanation, and it certainly doesn't mean he should have been allowed to test positive and continue competing.

. . . even if he remembers feeling constipated and his coach says he a sweetheart.

casual obsever wrote:

https://doi.org/10.1016/0003-2670(93)80275-P

Are you sure you are linking me to the right study? That is (69) in this statement:

“A first report described the ingestion of a substantial amount of non‐castrated pig meat (375 g) resulting in the excretion of 19‐norandrosterone in amounts reaching 3–7.5 ppb in the following hours. (69)

Another study confirmed that in spite of interindividual differences, 19‐NA and 19‐NE were always measured in specimens provided in the hours following the improbable ingestion (non‐castrated pig meat being difficult to find) of such meat‐rich meal composed of non‐castrated pig tissues, with levels even reaching 160 ng/ml in one case. (70)”

It would seem from context that “another study” means you really should link another study.

(70) also seems to show the same range of 3.1 to 7.5 ppb on 310g of meat.

Maybe you can also interpret Table 2 for me here:

It is definitely not “clostebol acetate” but “glucuroconjugated norandrosterone”.

While 300g of meat consistently gives a maximum of around 2 ng/ml in these subjects, it is not the same with liver, kidney, “sarapetal”, and heart.

Do I interpret it correctly that consuming 100g of liver gave one subject 14.4 ng/ml?

And consuming 300g of kidney, liver, heart mix gave three subjects with 21.4 ng/ml, 62.6 ng/ml, and one as much as 130 ng/ml for a 37 year old woman?

I don’t see stomach in the list, but it doesn’t seem to be much of a stretch to say that we don’t need a large quantity of “secret” ingredients in a burrito for a women to achieve 5 ng/ml.

Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

Buddy - it's not my science. And it's not a generalization - go read the abstract and if you have take issue with the method talk to B Le Bizec, I Gaudin, F Monteau, F Andre, S Impens, K De Wasch, H De Brabander - they are the authors.

I'll reiterate - you do realize how all these layers of "sample sizes" and "likely body mass figures" all factor into exactly what this excuse aims to do right? If you can extract enough (im)plausible perspectives from the reasoning it is all by design to promote the "yeah but what if" attempt at innocence. Don't be fooled.

I was inclined to let it go, but if you insist…

By “your study” of course I mean the study you linked me to, when you wanted to argue that large quantities of boar meat must be involved in order to reach a level of 5 ng/ml. I can hardly ask these authors to confirm your argument.

The fact is, that a sample size of three is not much to characterize what you want to argue. One of the subjects reached 7.5 ng/ml off of 310 g. With a sample size of three we could say that 33% of the population would show the same tendency. I wouldn’t, but we could. We could also say only 207g is required to get to 5.0 ng/ml. That is a lot of meat for a women to consume (almost a half-pound for the Americans), but not impossible for an endurance athlete in training to do in one meal.

But, see above response to “casual”, I found another study with 12 subjects which confirms that meat can lead to elevated nandrolone, but it is not nearly as effective as liver, heart, and kidney at causing excessive nandrolone in the urine.

pupil3142 wrote:

op here.

the whole point of this thread is to have the report publsihed so that we can put this speculation to bed.

presumably all these arguments were presented by the nike lawyers and cast aside.

that is why we need the report to be published.

and if the report doesnt establish that, then we are in trouble.

the story, for this thread, is not the speculation about the details about shelby, it is about the fact that the sporting establishment allows, nay even encourages such speculation, by avoiding essential transparency.

and shining this light is the raison d'etre of journalists in the face of a corrupt system (hi seb).

Sorry “op”. For my part, it was not my initial intention to dig up these details for a case that has essentially exhausted its litigation and appeals.

I do want to see some details from the report, as I listed earlier, and share the sentiment that it has been a long time for something they said would be published shortly.

I think the report can answer some questions, but not all of them.