Speaking on the Thoroughbred Daily News Writer's Room podcast this week, U.S. Anti-Coping Agency CEO Travis Tygart revealed the organization may have had a hand in the federal indictments that rocked the racing world last March.
Tygart revealed that USADA had handled a drug positive case with a cyclist who fell under the organization's jurisdiction and gotten information about the distributor of the drugs the cyclist was using. USADA became aware that the unnamed distributor also had connections to horse racing, and Tygart said the organization subsequently passed that information along to the FBI.
Tygart said USADA is still on a learning curve as it prepares to oversee anti-doping programs in horse racing, but he is confident a lot of the same principles will carry over from the world of human athletics. Like many equine drug testing experts, Tygart said post-competition testing should not be the only tool for an integrity program, and touted USADA's tip line, which it uses to help direct out-of-competition testing. Tests from tip information have a 22% positivity rate, according to Tygart — much higher than the typical rate for post-competition sampling.
Read more and listen to the full interview at the Thoroughbred Daily News
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