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Katerina Nash, a popular Czech rider based in California and a UCI vice president, was cleared overnight of doping allegations by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency.
Nash, 45, tested positive for capromorelin as the result of an out-of-competition urine sample she provided on October 24, 2022, USADA said.
Though the product is not on the WADA banned list, it could get athletes in trouble. Instead, USADA decided that “she was exposed to through no fault of her own.”
After an investigation, Nash will not face a period of ineligibility for her out-of-competition test, but under the World Anti-Doping Code, her no fault violation must be publicly disclosed, officials said.
“If there is no question that an athlete comes into contact with a prohibited substance from a completely innocent source and there is no effect on performance, USADA continues to advocate that there should not be a violation or a public announcement,” said Travis T. Tygart, Chief Executive Officer of USADA.
“The rules must change and all of us must wake up and demand a more fair and just global anti-doping system that catches and sanctions intentional cheats who rob clean athletes but does not railroad innocent athletes.”
It’s a rare example of an athlete being involved in a possible anti-doping violation, and later being cleared of allegations following an investigation.
Although not specifically listed on the WADA Prohibited List, capromorelin is considered by WADA to be a Non-Specified Substance in the class of Peptide Hormones, Growth Factors, Related Substances and Mimetics, USADA said.
It is prohibited at all times under the USADA Protocol for Olympic and Paralympic Movement Testing, the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee National Anti-Doping Policy, and the International Cycling Union Anti-Doping Rules, all of which have adopted the World Anti-Doping Code and the WADA Prohibited List.
Nash told investigators the product was used to treat her pet dog.
During USADA’s investigation into her case, Nash provided USADA with records of a prescription liquid pet medication containing capromorelin, an appetite stimulant.
According to USADA, she was administering the medication orally to her dog each day during the final weeks of her pet’s life in an effort to maintain weight. Due to the difficulty of administering oral pet medication, Nash would frequently come into contact with the liquid medication via her hands, and the medication bottle did not warn users about the risk of contamination from transdermal exposure.
USADA, together with laboratory experts, conducted a study of transdermal exposure using the same pet medication containing capromorelin, which established that coming into direct contact with the pet medication would cause a positive test.
Importantly, these studies demonstrated that the athlete’s exposure scenario with the medication correlated with the trace levels, 0.07 ng/mL (70 parts per trillion), of capromorelin found in her urine sample. There is currently no threshold for capromorelin, so any level triggers an adverse analytical finding.
USADA therefore concluded that Nash had no fault or negligence with respect to the presence of capromorelin in her sample.
“As in this case, we always work as hard to try to exonerate the truly innocent as we do to convict those who intentionally cheat,” Tygart said.
USADA officials said its investment of time, resources, and expertise into determining the truth regarding the positive test, Nash will not face a period of ineligibility.
Nash, a former skier at two winter Olympics before switching to cycling, could have faced a four-year ban.
USADA also said since the sample was collected out-of-competition, there are no competitive results, which under the rules would have had to be disqualified.