WADA Prohibited List updated
The World Anti-Doping Agency has issued an updated List of Prohibited Substances and Methods that will come into force on 1 January 2024.
Among the changes, the use of tramadol as a painkiller is now prohibited in-competition. The amendment was made after research studies, funded by WADA, confirmed its potential to enhance sports performance.
The recommended ‘washout period’ for tramadol will be communicated by WADA before 1 January 2024. The ‘washout period’ refers to the time from the last administered dose to the time of the start of the in-competition period.
Athletes and their entourages should familiarize themselves with all of the changes to the Prohibited List. Click here for a summary of the major modifications.
If a medication you use is on the list, you need to apply for a Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) before using it. Find out more about TUEs in our newest video.
An average of one to five TUEs are issued in biathlon each year (for various types of medication for long-term or short-term usage), with no abuse of TUEs in the sport detected to date.
Always remember: if you need to use a medication for your medical treatment, you must make sure to check the Prohibited List before using it!
Preparing for the new season
“Be your own best friend”, says BIU athlete ambassador Chloe Levins.
With the new season fast approaching, the BIU spoke to its recently-appointed athlete ambassador, USA’s Chloe Levins, about preparing mentally and physically for the demands ahead, in its latest podcast interview.
Chloe has some great advice about eating healthily, the use of techniques such as visualisation, and how to avoid illnesses, such as cold and infections, when travelling to races.
Chloe also emphasises the importance for mental health of being able to switch off from racing. She herself makes sure that she always travels with a book to read, and stresses the value of meditative practices, whether it’s knitting or playing an instrument.
She concludes with this valuable tip for young athletes: “Frustration really is the thief of growth: it’s better to be your own best friend than your own worst critic in a sport like biathlon”.
Click here for the full interview.
BIU launches improved reporting hotline
The BIU has made some important changes to its online platform for reporting wrongdoing in biathlon.
Among the changes, the platform has been made more user-friendly, including its availability in three languages: English, Russian and German. What’s more, you can reach us via telephone and email. Feel free to use BIU Reporting Hotlineyour own language when sending an email of submitting a report.
And it’s not just about doping. The hotline is open to report any suspected breaches of the IBU’s governance, ethics and integrity rules.
The platform plays a crucial role in the BIU’s campaign to ensure that biathlon is a fair, clean and trusted sport. We depend on everyone involved in the sport, from athletes to national federation officers, being prepared to make use of the hotline if they see or hear something that isn’t right.
You are our eyes and ears. Even the smallest piece of information can make a big difference in helping to ensure the integrity of biathlon.
And remember: if you make use of the hotline, your identity and the information you give us will remain strictly confidential.
To access the platform and hotline, and for more details, click here.
Athlete vulnerability
A podcast interview with Cornelia Blank, professor and deputy head of the Institute for Sports Medicine, Alpine Medicine and Health Tourism at the Private University for Health Sciences and Health Technology UMIT TIROL in Hall in Tirol, Austria.
In our latest podcast interview we spoke to Cornelia Blank about athletes’ vulnerability, in particular to doping. What is athlete vulnerability, what influences it, how can coaches and others in authority spot the signs and how can we make athletes less vulnerable?
The podcast echoes a session on athlete vulnerability led by Cornelia during the IBU Academy Coaches Course Level 2 in Oberhof on 23 to 27 September, 2023. Twenty coaches from various countries participated, many of them extremely experienced national team coaches.
With a background in health sciences and psychology, Cornelia’s research focuses on prevention and health promotion in and by means of sport, giving her a unique insight into the topic.
Listen to the full interview here.
Combating abuse in sport
The BIU spoke to Allison Forsyth, a former Alpine skier who was herself a victim, about safeguarding and Safe Sport.
She discussed her own experience of abuse, how the culture of sport, with frequent travel, can make athletes vulnerable and whether sports organisations are getting better at tackling it.
She also spoke of the need for change in the culture of hiring coaches, and how victims might not even know they’re being abused.
Listen to the full interview here.
Meet our new Athlete Ambassador!
A podcast interview with our newly-appointed Athlete Ambassador Lovro Planko
In the second in our series of podcast interviews with the BIU’s two new athlete ambassadors. Slovenia’s Lovro Planko spoke to us about why becoming a BIU athlete ambassador enables him to give back to the sport.
He also told us how he avoids forgetting to register his whereabouts and advised young athletes facing their first anti-doping test not to be nervous, and relax!
And – as the BIU launches its Summer of Respect campaign – Lovro told us what respect in biathlon means to him.
Click here to listen to the interview.
Meet our new Athlete Ambassador!
The BIU has just appointed two new athlete ambassadors. We spoke first to USA’s Chloe Levins about her motivation in becoming a BIU athlete ambassador, about the role of the athlete ambassador and what athlete ambassadors can do to help to ensure the integrity of biathlon.
Chloe discussed with us the importance of athletes using our hotline to report any wrongdoing (e.g., breaches of the safeguarding rules, doping and match-fixing), her research into the history of how performance-enhancing techniques were utilized in Olympic sports as leverage for political power and what golf can teach other sports about honesty and integrity.
Click here to listen to the interview – you don’t want to miss it!
Dr Katja Mjøsund at the IBU Physician Seminar
The BIU welcomed a presentation by Dr Katja Mjøsund on the subject of Medication and Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) at an IBU Physician Seminar on 14 June 2023, which included some useful tips on an important topic for athletes and coaches.
Dr Mjøsund is a consultant physician specialized in sports and exercise medicine. Her primary message to the participants at the seminar was that athletes need to be careful when taking any medication, while coaches and team doctors should also be aware of the risks, and ensure that athletes check any medication before using it.
Dr Mjøsund said: “Health is a prerequisite to performance, success and development in sports. Although endurance athletes are in general healthy, athletes can still fall ill and require medical treatment.
“When assessing medications in athletes it’s important to consider interactions, side effects, possible effects on performance and various regulations, primarily the list of prohibited substances and methods in sports, published yearly by WADA.”
Medications can be checked at The Global Drug Reference Online (Global DRO), which provides athletes with information about the status of certain medications based on the current World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Prohibited list.
Global GRO can be found at: https://www.globaldro.com/Home
Alternatively, athletes can consult the Medication Database of their own National Anti-Doping Organisations (NADOs).
Meanwhile, more details on TUEs can be found on the BIU website, which explains the process for TUE Applications.
Dr Mjösund concluded: “Health and proper medical care are fundamental rights for athletes, as they are for everyone. Sometimes an athlete’s medical condition might require treatment with a prohibited substance or method. To ensure fairness and also a level playing field in sports, while also optimizing the medical care of the athlete, a rigorous process of Therapeutic Use Exemptions has been created.
“The TUE process is designed to ensure that the athlete gets the required medical care without any additional effect on performance (other than a return to the athlete’s normal state of health).”
Dr. Katja Mjøsund
Dr. Mjøsund is head physician at the Olympic Training Centre in Helsinki, a senior advisor at the Paavo Nurmi Centre, University of Turku, a sports medicine consultant at clinic Aava, and a team physician for national orienteering and biathlon teams.
She also has a strong research background and expertise in skeletal muscle energy metabolism, Dr Mjøsund serves as an expert for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and a member of the International Testing Agency Therapeutic Use Exemption Committee.
BIU publishes annual report 2022-2023
BIU publishes annual report 2022-2023
The Biathlon Integrity Unit today published its Annual Report for the period May 2022 to April 2023, a year in which the BIU’s focus has been on prevention of wrongdoing.
In her introductory message to this, the BIU’s third annual report, Louise Reilly, chair of the BIU’s Board, comments: “Our approach is not about retribution. It is about anticipating and attempting to prevent integrity breaches from occurring in the first place. It is about being pro-active, so that everyone in the Biathlon community knows from the outset what is expected of them and how to play fair.”
Out of a total budget of €1.70 million (compared with €1.76 million last year), the report shows that 58 per cent was spent on Sample Collection & Analysis, 14 per cent on Operations, 13 per cent on Prevention (up from 11 per cent last year), 9 per cent on Legal Support, 3 per cent on the BIU Board and 3 per cent on Other.
In the field of anti-doping, the BIU collected 1,389 samples, of which 64 per cent were collected out of competition. In total, 418 athletes from 33 nations were tested (compared with 341 athletes from 31 nations last year).
However, in the report, Greg McKenna, Head of the BIU writes: “We are aware there may be a misconception that the BIU’s work is almost exclusively concerned with anti-doping testing. The truth is that there is much more to the BIU’s work than testing. As I explained in a podcast interview recorded in February 2023, the BIU seeks to support the Biathlon family in protecting the integrity of the sport, and, aligned with that, to ensure the safety and wellbeing of all participants.”
The podcast can be found here.
The BIU believes that education is a key component to all prevention activities, and starting this year, a new focus was set on two important integrity topics, in addition to Anti-Doping: Match-Fixing (Competition Manipulation) and Safeguarding.
The BIU also continued its collaboration with the IBU’s Development Department, with a particular emphasis on Coaches through its contribution to IBU Academy’s Coaches Courses. The focus was on educating young athletes, through educational activities at IOC-IBU development camps, IBU and Junior Cups and Youth and Junior World Championships.
Other highlights of the year included:
· A new video explaining what the BIU is, how it works and how it can help athletes and all members of the Biathlon Family. The video can be viewed here;
· A new Safeguarding survey by the BIU, which found that nearly three-quarters of Biathlon’s National Federations that responded to the survey had a Safeguarding code of conduct in place;
· An outreach, including a quiz, on Competition Manipulation at the 2022 Summer Biathlon World Championships in Ruhpolding, Germany;
· For the first time, the BIU took responsibility for overseeing the process of electing officials at an IBU Congress, after the BIU Board was asked to act as the election committee;
· The introduction of a mandatory ‘Biathlon Integrity Certificate’, which aims to ensure that everyone dealing with athletes has a basic knowledge of integrity and anti-doping matters;
· An agreement with the Switzerland-based sports tech and data firm Sportradar to use the specialist equipment provided by its Sportradar Integrity Services (SIS) division to monitor IBU competitions;
· The addition of Dr. Tanja Haug, a sports law expert with more than 20 years of experience, to the BIU’s Board;
· The introduction of a ‘Whereabouts Certificate’ that all athletes that are part of the IBU’s Registered Testing Pool must obtain by completing an online course;
· The recruitment of two new BIU Athlete Ambassadors: Chloe Levins (USA) and Lovro Planko (Slovenia);
The BIU Annual Report May 2022 to April 2023 can be found here
Note to editors
The Biathlon Integrity Unit is an operationally independent and specialised unit of the International Biathlon Union. It was established in 2019 in order to ensure all of Biathlon’s stakeholders can have confidence that ethical issues in the sport will be addressed independently and expertly.
