One thing about chemistry: it?s complicated. Nothing is ever really static. Chemical academia is advancing all the time. I?m not a chemist, though I do have a fairly minor qualification in neuro-pharmacology. Heady days. My qualification is of no use to Billy Joe Saunders, or Frank Warren, but they should both have taken heed of the complexities and importance of chemicals when they entered a) the defensive stance vs. Billy Joe?s VADA positive test result for Oxilofrine and, b) operating in professional boxing per se.
I?d never heard of Oxilofrine prior to last week. And, like a lot of us, my ear was turned to what exactly the Massachusetts State honchos, Billy Joe, and Frank Warren had to say about it before I lazily looked up the drug on Wikipedia.
Frank Warren says it was a simple mistake; that Oxilofrine is present in a simple decongestant nose spray. I was kind of surprised he didn?t say it was present in Wild Boar meat: the current popular choice of the pro boxer caught out by a positive blood test. So I looked up his claims. Here?s what I found/couldn?t find:
1) I couldn?t find Oxilofrine (also is known as Methylsynephrine or P-Hydroxyephedrine) listed as an ingredient in any over the counter nasal sprays in the UK that I came across. Okay, there may be one I missed, but I can tell you it doesn?t appear to be a common additive to nasal remedy sprays. 2) Oxilofrine is an amphetamine-like chemical. It acts to increase heart efficiency and blood pressure and oxygen exchange. It was first synthesized in the 1930?s and mimics Ephedrine. Oxilofrine has been banned widely by WADA since 2006. Obviously, it?s a drug that can be open to abuse by an athlete to help them achieve an unfair advantage. 3) Adverse side effects can include: Cardiac Arrest. In short, it can put the user at risk.
But here?s where we disappear down the rabbit hole. You see, even though the US Food and Drug Administration had banned Oxilofrine for over a decade, in 2016 a scientific journal called ?Drug testing and analysis? released research findings that said it had found the drug in 14 different ?Dietary Supplements.? And in each case, the product had failed to list Oxilofrine as an ingredient. According to the FDA, ?Oxilofrine doesn?t occur naturally in any plant that we?re aware of.? Making it a nefarious, at best, addition, and showing us to what extent supplement companies will go to gain an edge. Is it possible a fighter really could ingest this drug by accident even though the FDA wrote strongly-worded letters in 2016 to the companies found to be illegally including Oxilofrine in their products? I guess it might be.
So where does this leave Billy Joe? Well, Frank could have, perhaps, considered his options before talking about nasal sprays. Did he get good advice? Did he panic? One thing we know is that he must be a sore as hell for the cancellation of the Andrade fight. He says he intends to sue someone, for something. Frank even had a swipe at Eddie Hearn, saying Eddie would be happy not having to pay a ?seven figure purse,? now that Saunders wouldn?t be fighting. He queried the legality of the license withdrawal?WADA doesn?t consider Oxilofrine illegal if a fighter tests positive for it leading up to a fight, only on the day of the fight, yet it is banned in the US by the FDA as a supplement, and banned by VADA full stop (who caught Saunders on their test).
When big bucks are on the line after a failed drug test the first thing you always hear are the same old excuses: ?Accidental,? ?Read the small print,? ?He?s no cheat,? yet here we are. Another fighter fails a drug test for a substance shown to increase their advantage over an opponent. The promoter can only do one thing?lash out at everyone. They have to remain loyal to their fighter. To do anything else is to consign your income stream, and potentially a friend, to the trash can.
I think we need to ask some questions and, unlikely as it is, try to gain some answers.
Is the banned substance list too complicated? Did Saunders ingest Oxilofrine unknowingly? Is the supplement market too dodgy to trust? Can you be a World Champion by only eating normal food; without protein shakes; nasal sprays; power gels; etc. etc.? Is talent and hard work not enough anymore? Who can we trust? Who decides the moral high ground in our sport?
Will there ever be a solution?
