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.
BIU Whereabouts Certificate
From the beginning of May 2023 all athletes that are part of the IBU’s Registered Testing Pool (RTP) will be required to obtain a Whereabouts Certificate by completing an online course.
Athletes in the RTP are those that are identified as the highest priority by the IBU at international level, and by their National Anti-Doping Organisations at national level. They are therefore subject to focused testing, for which they must provide quarterly Whereabouts information. This includes information about their overnight accommodation, regular activities and competition participation, which must be filed. through the ADAMS system.
The aim is to enable testing agencies to locate and test them without advance notice.
Athletes should beware of failing to provide accurate information about their Whereabouts location. This can include forgetting to update information already given, when moving from place to place.
Such errors are punishable by a ban of up to 12 months, if three are committed within a 12-month period.
The aim of the Certificate is to avoid such unnecessary errors when filing Whereabouts information. The online course can be found here.
The BIU has produced a video on submitting Whereabouts information, which can be viewed here.
Insights from a former athlete
How do experienced athletes juggle their sporting ambitions with a career away from sport? How does their approach to racing and training change over the course of their career? What advice would they give to junior athletes who are just starting out?
In this podcast interview, Austria’s Julian Eberhard, the recently-retired biathlete who won four IBU World Cup victories and two World Championships bronze medals in a career spanning 15 years, takes time out to consider these and other questions.
As an athlete ambassador for the BIU, the experience he gathered during his long career means he has some great advice for up-and-coming athletes.
Click here to listen to the interview.
IBU and BIU take note of the Økokrim announcement on Besseberg case.
The International Biathlon Union (IBU) and the independent Biathlon Integrity Unit (BIU) take note of the announcement by (Økokrim), the Norwegian National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime, that Anders Besseberg, former IBU President, has been indicted on charges of aggravated corruption.
The IBU and the BIU have worked closely with the Økokrim on this complex and long running case and will continue to offer their full and unconditional support in reaching a resolution.
The IBU Executive Board appointed an independent External Review Commission (ERC), chaired by Jonathan Taylor QC, in November 2018 to conduct a full investigation into allegations made against Mr Besseberg. The ERC was independent from the police investigations.
Following an exhaustive investigation, the ERC concluded that Mr Besseberg had a case to answer for breach of the IBU’s rules, based on their apparent protection of Russian interests, particularly in the anti-doping context, without good justification.
The BIU now continues the work started by the ERC.
The Økokrim media release can be found here:
The Biathlon Integrity Unit is an operationally independent and specialised unit of the International Biathlon Union. It was established in order to ensure all of Biathlon’s stakeholders can have confidence that ethical issues in the sport will be addressed independently and expertly.
Play True Day 2023
Every April since 2014, the anti-doping community worldwide has come together to celebrate the World Anti-Doping Agency’s Play True Day.
Play True Day is a day that is dedicated to Clean Sport and raising awareness among athletes, the sporting public and others of the importance of preventing doping.
The IBU and the BIU are delighted to support this important initiative, which takes place today, 14 April 2023. Biathlon athletes are strongly encouraged to participate as well.
The digital campaign is a shout-out for true sport, reaching millions of people worldwide every year. It is designed to give everyone involved in sport the chance to contribute to clean sport.
This year’s theme is #OnePlayTrueTeam, focusing on the importance of your team.
We asked some athletes and coaches: ‘Who (in your Team) inspires you to Play True?’
The answers we received included:
“I am proud and inspired by my whole team. I think that whoever you hang out with, you act the same […] Play safe and play fair!” (Lovro Planko, SLO)
“My whole team inspires me because they are always against cheating and they are fighting for the truth.” (Markèta Davidová, CZE)
Show us what playing true means to you, and tag us in your Instagram post!
Get your Play True frame from the WADA webpage (https://www.wada-ama.org/en/play-true-day-assets).
Nutrition for the Off-Season
During the season, biathletes need to focus on their diets, as their overall athletic performance depends on how well they fuel their body. Biathletes should focus on the quality of food they eat and refuel when their body needs it. A good mixture of enough carbohydrates and proteins is crucial: carbohydrates give your body the energy it needs, and protein helps to repair and build muscle.
However, it’s important to find a balance between following a diet and allowing room for comfort eating: With the 2022-23 season having reached its conclusion, BIU Athlete Ambassadors for integrity matters Anastasiya Merkushyna (Ukraine) and Sebastian Samuelsson (Sweden) are encouraging athletes to drop the diets, eat healthily – and relax.
Sebastian said: “As a biathlete your body is what you work with. Therefore, it’s important what you eat. But I also like to relax a lot and spring is a time where you don’t have to think about dieting at all!”
The off season is also the time where you can do something for your mental health and wellbeing, and therefor Anastasia states: “We need good food to top up our energy levels, but in spring we also need to think about our mental health, and sometimes the easiest way to do that is just to eat food that is delicious without worrying about how much we eat.”
