FIBA carried out an extensive anti-doping program in the lead-up and during its main events in 2014, with the results confirming that all players who participated are clean and reinforcing the fact that basketball is a low-risk doping sport.
More than 300 samples were collected over the course of the FIBA Basketball World Cup, the FIBA World Championship for Women and the FIBA U17 World Championships for Men and Women, with a minimum of three players per team tested.
The testing was carried out to establish Athlete Biological Passports (ABPs) and to detect Human Growth Hormones (HGH) and Erythropoietin (EPO) among others.
The findings showed that no prohibited substance were detected in any of the samples. Three of them indicated atypical findings, but further analysis confirmed the values were natural.
“The scale of the anti-doping program we had in place in 2014 was bigger than ever before and shows our ever-growing commitment to keep this game as clean as it always has been and hopefully always will be,” said FIBA Secretary General and International Olympic Committee (IOC) Member Patrick Baumann.
In both senior championships, FIBA divided the testing in three phases: on-site pre-event testing, rest day testing and in-competition testing.
The program was enacted long before the tournaments tipped off, with FIBA including players expected to participate at the events in its Registered Testing Pool (RTP) for extensive and thorough out-of-competition testing phases, which resulted in 100 samples being collected.
The world governing body for basketball worked closely together with multiple National Anti-Doping Organisations (NADOs) to ensure smart and effective testing, with the majority of the bodies keen to share resources and intelligence. This collaboration also enabled FIBA to establish ABPs for some of its top level players by collecting 80 blood and urine samples.
The testing carried out at the FIBA U17 World Championships helped get a better idea of the education the future stars of the game were given back in their home countries about anti-doping. Moving forward, this will assist FIBA in further developing education programs with the respective NADOs.
FIBA approached the National Anti-Doping Organisation of each national team that participated in its leading events in 2014 and closely collaborated with 16 of them.
The experience of this extensive anti-doping program will help FIBA implement the new requirements and principles of the new World Anti-Doping Code which comes into effect on 1 January 2015.
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