BY anthonyrobertsonline
If you were one of the mere 50 people who was reading my blog just after 6pm EST yesterday, you were among the first people in the country to learn that Patrick Arnold had his facilities raided. Either Baseball Prospectus or Yahoo!Sports had the story right after me, Dr. Stevens of SteroidsLive was on board very quickly, and the New York Times soon followed. All of those links represent some serious sports journalists doing what they do best, and they’re all great reads.
One of the things that I’ve always loved about the blogosphere is that it is co-operative and not competitive.
Today I’m going to try to flesh out some other details of the story that I didn’t cover yesterday. I think I’ve exhausted the resources of my pal in Boston, but I can still provide a substantial amount of additional information that can be of use to everybody.
Patrick ArnoldThe rumor at this point is that the DEA is attempting to find out whether Patrick Arnold has been spiking his supplements with anything. Allegedly they’re looking for documents or other proof that he’s gotten his hands on some of the materials necessary to spike his 6-OXO with androstenedione or something similar (naturally this is because Major League Baseball is claiming J.C. Romero tested positive for this substance). I’m not sure of the legal status of 6-OXO, but this study conducted in Belgium calls 6-OXO an anabolic steroid, and this study reveals that taking Androstenedione (androst-4-ene-3,17-dione) will result in a urinary metabolite of 6a-OH-androstenedione - and that 6-OXO (androst-4-ene-3,6,17-trione) will actually produce this same metabolite .
So even though you’d test positive by taking 6-OXO, the government may be wanting to check if Patrick is spiking it with andro. This would actually make sense, in a weird way…you’d test positive for Andro even by taking the unspiked product - therefore if Patrick added some Andro into it (illegally), nobody would ever know from a doping test.
Proviant Technologies, Inc.
The other question I’ve been getting is whether or not Proviant Technologies (the company that formerly owned Ergopharm) was also raided. The answer here is logically going to be yes…I’m reasonably sure that Proviant Technologies (formerly known as LPJ Research, and co-owned by Patrick Arnold and Ramlakhan Boodram) was raided also. Proviant lists a P.O. Box as their address, but on the Ergopharm website it is revealed that Proviant/Ergopharm share the same physical address. It is highly likely that the search warrant covered both companies, as they are under the same roof.
Hot Stuff BottleI should note that spiking supplements is nothing new to the nutritional industry. Commonly, nutritional companies will add an unlisted (and often illegal) ingredient to their first batch of a given product. The rumor in the industry has always been that Hot Stuff was spiked with methyltestosterone. Personally I always thought it was spiked with Dianabol. Remember, I’ve had 4 nutritional supplements produced with my name on them, and I know a bit about this industry. Spiking a first batch is very common. You get people to buy it, it gives them great results, and they keep buying it even after you drop the secret ingredient.
RorschachI don’t personally know Patrick (I may have corresponded with him once or twice a couple of years ago), and I certainly don’t know much about his ethics or morals. But I can tell you that more than one person in the supplement industry has heard him say that he’s broke (ErgoPharm had less than $1m in sales last year), and the conjecture is that one spiked batch might be a possibility to boost sales. This isn’t my conjecture, as I wouldn’t presume to know him per se, but it’s a concern that has been voiced by more than one person in the industry. This would ironic, as Patrick has acted as a self-appointed (annointed?) watchman for the supplement industry over the past few years (which in itself is quite a conflict of interest, as it’s the industry he earns his living from).
Of course, I don’t know for sure that the government is looking for evidence of spiking supplements - but it’s a very solid bet at this point. If I get any additional information, I’ll drop it like it’s hot, right into my blog.
