Attorneys for Peter Bol say Sporting Integrity Australia ought to drop its investigation into the Australian athletics star after two impartial labs cleared him of utilizing artificial EPO.
Key factors:
- Peter Bol’s group despatched his pattern to 2 impartial labs, in keeping with 9 newspapers
- Bol’s lawyer says the labs’ testing “by no means confirmed any presence of artificial EPO”
- A letter from the lawyer says the testing that returned a constructive end result from Bol’s A-sample was marred by “inexperience and incompetence”
Bol — who completed fourth within the 800 metres on the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 — was provisionally suspended from the game in January after it was revealed his A-sample had come again constructive for EPO.
His B-sample, when examined by the World Anti-Doping Company, returned an “atypical” end result and that allowed him to return to the game.
Bol has maintained his innocence all through the method, however mentioned the preliminary end result being made public has completely tarnished his fame.
After that B-sample got here again, Bol’s group despatched the pattern to 2 impartial laboratories that specialise on this type of testing.
EPO, or endogenous erythropoietin, is a naturally occurring hormone within the human physique that promotes purple blood cell manufacturing, however artificial EPO has been utilized by athletes — most infamously cyclists reminiscent of Lance Armstrong — to extend stamina.
A letter from Bol’s lawyer, Paul Greene, mentioned the testing on the Australian Sport Drug Testing Laboratory was marred by “inexperience and incompetence … [which] led to an incorrect willpower” of the A-sample.
The letter mentioned the impartial testing “by no means confirmed any presence of artificial EPO”.
Sporting Integrity Australia (SIA) remains to be conducting an investigation into Bol’s samples, however Mr Greene mentioned the SIA was probably not investigating and will publicly apologise.
“They’ve an obligation below the principles to come back out and say: ‘There’s nothing right here’,” Greene mentioned on 9’s As we speak program.
The Australian nationwide championships begin in Brisbane on Thursday and Bol mentioned he would like to be competing there, however will as a substitute refocus on the world championships in Hungary in August.
“I do not assume there’s a single Australian athlete who received the 800m 4 instances in a row and I used to be imagined to be there,” he instructed As we speak.
“It’s disappointing. We are going to transfer on. We’ve world champs, heading to Europe, racing there.
“I would favor to race in Australia and provides the Australian public, I suppose, time on the monitor. As a result of they’ve supported me the entire approach.”
Greene has given SIA 9 days to reply.
