USOC to test doping pilot program

CHICAGO -- The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency is preparing to launch a voluntary pilot program it hopes will improve the accuracy of doping tests.

The anti-doping agency will profile the body chemistry of 12 participating athletes using a series of blood and urine tests, and those measurements will be used as a baseline for subsequent tests.

The program was described to The Associated Press by two people familiar with it, but who did not want to be identified because final details are still being worked out.

At a news conference Wednesday, track athletes Brian Clay and Allyson Felix each announced they were part of the project, called "Project Believe."

"I know for me, anytime I get an opportunity to let someone know I'm clean, I take it," decathlete Clay said. "USADA picked a few athletes that they're going to test a whole lot. The goal is to prove we're clean instead of dirty, and we want to be part of that."

The program is being set up to augment the current system after the Beijing Olympics, a quest USADA has been charged with by the U.S. Olympic Committee, which established the independent agency in 2000.

USADA's CEO, Travis Tygart, acknowledged a longitudinal testing program is in the works and said he expects a more formal announcement in the near future.

But under a series of questions about doping at a U.S. Olympic Committee news conference, Clay and Felix revealed the program. Felix said it requires her to be tested twice a week, giving a total of five vials of blood, and repeat the regimen over a "period of time."

"Whatever I can do to prove that I'm clean, I'll do it, no matter what time I have to wake up, where I have to drive," Felix said.

One person familiar with the program told AP there will be mechanisms in the program to add to the original list of 12 volunteers.

The program will be similar to one the international cycling federation is trying to introduce _ a so-called "longitudinal passport" program that many anti-doping experts believe can be more effective in detecting drug cheats than the current system.

One person with knowledge of the pilot program told the AP the program would exceed what the UCI program attempts because it will combine blood and urine testing; the UCI program is only with blood.

This type of system could someday replace the current anti-doping system, which establishes arbitrary limits for a large number of controlled substances. It's believed athletes can manipulate the system so they can dope but remain under the threshold where they'd get caught.

The passport system would measure an athlete's baseline numbers against numbers gleaned from later tests, in or out of competition, and if the numbers varied by enough, it could be considered a positive test.

These tests wouldn't necessarily look for specific substances, but could detect changes in body chemistry that would indicate use.