Drug Testing and Supplements

Yesterday morning I was awoken by a knock at the door at 7:12 am.  I almost didn't wake up- but then realized who it was and knew I had to- it was USADA.  USADA is the United States Anti-Doping Association- the organization that performs the random drug tests on all the athletes in the registered testing pool, which is athletes who are trying or currently do represent the U.S. in various sports.  As an athlete, we are subject to random testing- including at 7:12 in the morning!  We have to let USADA know where we are staying and what our daily activities are, including giving them a one hour time window stating exactly where we are and remain there for that entire hour (mine is usually 6am-7am just because I know I won't have a workout at 7am lol).  So I got up, did everything necessary for the drug test (which includes a full frontal urine sample), and then went back to bed before getting back up at 8:30am to start my day.

The trickiest thing about USADA and drug testing is not whether or not your directly taking banned substances- it's the supplements.  Many athletes, including myself, take supplements to help not only recover from workouts, but also for general health reasons- stuff like a multivitamin, fish oil, etc. etc. supplements many of the average population take for various health reasons.  The tricky thing about the supplements is you can never be sure if it doesn't contain a product that is a banned substance.  Supplements are not controlled by the FDA, so what the label says is in the product may or may not be actually what's in there.  USADA's stance on supplements is not to take them, however, with the amount of training we all do, we need things like multivitamins as our training places so much stress on our body.  As athletes, we must be very careful of what we put in our bodies and each time we take supplements we run the risk of testing positive.  Many supplement companies now put guarantees on their supplements stating they are clean and rewarding you monetarily if you do happen to test positive, which is great, but it's still always a risk.  Personally, I take supplements, and check USADA's drug reference religiously to make sure my supplements or their ingredients aren't banned (however, most of the supplements are not on the drug reference!).  For me, I feel that the supplements help me stay healthy, which is a risk I have to take each time a pop a pill.