The rumor of the demise of triathlon's stated position on blood doping seems to have been greatly exaggerated. On Dec. 9, Reuters News Service reported that, according to Dr. Patrick Schamasch, the International Olympic Committee's medical director, "...the international cycling and triathlon federations had asked to carry out tests to check the level of red blood cells in competitors' bodies before races." While the UCI, cycling's international federation, has been conducting blood tests prior to competition, the International Triathlon Union--triathlon's international federation--has steadfastly been against such tests. While cycling's pre-competition blood-testing is fashioned as a health measure, it is widely regarded as a way to keep blood-dopers (primarily takers of erythropoetin, or EPO) from toeing the starting line.

Mark Sisson, ITU treasurer and architect of most drug-testing protocols in triathlon since developing the first one in 1989, said his federation's stance remains consistent and was misrepresented in the news: "We were completely blindsided by the story. We are as adamant as ever that we will not conduct blood-testing as a health screen prior to competition. This runs completely contrary to our stated goals: that we will use every effort to stop drug-taking. Our feeling is that so-called health screening simply allows anyone to dope up to a hematocrit of 48 or 49 [percent red blood cells compared to total blood volume] right before the race. Another athlete training in the high altitude of Colombia might be disallowed the ability to race after legitimately achieving a hematocrit of 52. How is that fair?"

Blood-testing misses the point, according to Sisson. "This whole hematocrit thing is the biggest farce ever perpetrated on the sporting world. If the health of our athletes was the motivating force behind our drug-testing, we'd be letting them take all the drugs," he said. "Why allow an athlete to experience adrenal failure due to excessive overtraining, let us say, when there are drugs that can keep that from happening? That's the point of these drugs--they enhance performance, they all have legitimate uses in medicine, all are designed to make a person healthy. But that is not the path we've chosen in sport. Instead we've decided to ban performance-enhancers, and we believe that is the only legitimate use for a drug test."

Sisson believes that Dr. Schamasch made an offhand remark during a press conference that a couple of sports are doing hematocrit testing and will be doing it as a pre-screening process leading up to the Olympic Games. "Triathlon gets mentioned and the next thing you know, a couple of newswire stories get out to that effect, and the whole thing snowballs," Sisson said. But he stressed that the ITU is not against testing blood--as opposed to urine--for banned substances, just that it should only be used as a means to ferret out athletes who take such substances, and only by means of a positive, foolproof test result for a banned drug. Until there is a legitimate, foolproof test for EPO, the ITU and the IOC won't test for it.

Dr. Schamasch appeared to have recognized immediately that he might have misspoken, or that his words were misinterpreted. Sisson said the ITU received correspondence shortly after the event in which Dr. Schamasch explained, according to Sisson, that the press "...missed my explanation, but I have seen in the media that triathlon has been incorporated [into the list of sports set to employ pre-race blood testing]...and that this is maybe a misinterpretation."