Athletes should share their location with anti-doping officials

The World Anti-Doping Code requires athletes listed in a Registered Testing Pool (RTP) to constantly update their whereabouts because the information is critical in assisting in the doping control process.

At any given time, a sizeable number of international and national level athletes are included in this pool.

It consists of elite and other athletes from all sports disciplines selected by a national anti-doping organisation or international federation of a particular sport represented by the athlete in question.

According to the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada), information on the whereabouts of an athlete gives an anti-doping organisation the ability to locate athletes with no advance notice, which is vital to testing, hence the ability to catch dopers.

Knowledge on where athletes can be found for testing is crucial for ensuring effective anti-doping programs because doping tests do not necessarily have to be conducted during competitions. Doping tests can be carried out randomly, at any place and time.

It is important, however, to note that not all athletes are subject to whereabouts requirements. This only affects those who are in RTP and who must comply with the requirement.

Wada is not responsible for deciding who should be part of these registered testing pools; that is the responsibility of international federations and anti-doping organisations that use their discretion.

The vice

Some of the factors that inform the inclusion of an athlete into a registered testing pool include sudden improvement in performance during the year, return from injury, retirement, or sanction, doping intelligence, and the lack of a national level testing programmes among others.

Athletes may find this bothersome, but it is important for them to understand that failure to file their whereabouts constitutes an anti-doping rule violation.

This means that an athlete can be punished for failing to update their location at any given time so long as they are in the registered testing pool.

In principle, this is aimed at promoting effective and efficient testing of athletes with a view to combat doping and in effect protect the clean athletes.

This information also acts as an enabler to intelligence-led efforts to deal with the menace. It is a process where athletes who are suspected to be engaging in suspicious doping activities are monitored and tested.

Anti-doping efforts the world over are continually being improved and enhanced in line with technological changes.

There has also been mounting concern among those involved in the fight against the menace in sport that the industry in which the vice thrives is also constantly evolving.

This has seen cheaters resort to using complex methods whose detection can be problematic when subjected to less complicated forms of scrutiny, which means athletes given to cheating could easily get away.

Football clubs

Elite and national athletes are role models to the upcoming ones and they have an important responsibility to protect the integrity of their sport.

In view of this, therefore, it is incumbent among them to provide complete, current and accurate whereabouts information as their way of promoting the fight against doping.

A perfect example of how filing whereabouts affects athletes can be traced back to 2017 when Manchester City and Bournemouth English football clubs were both charged by The Football Association for failing to notify officials of player whereabouts for doping controls.

The sanction for a whereabouts failure is two-year period of disqualification, which can be reduced to a minimum of one year depending on the athlete’s degree of fault.

However, a reduction in the standard period of exclusion of two years is not available to athletes where there is a proven pattern of last-minute whereabouts changes or other conduct that raises suspicion that the athlete was trying to avoid being available for testing.

As per the World Anti-Doping Code, it is in black and white that an athlete cannot rely on a team to provide accurate location information and is, therefore, open to sanction if found to be at fault.

However, such an athlete could benefit from a reduction of sanction if his or her degree of fault is not considered to be substantial.

It is, therefore, important for athletes in registered testing pools, and their support personnel, to ensure that they always update their locations with the relevant body to avoid sanctions.

Mr Mwangi is the immediate former Head of Communications, Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya