Austrian athelets may have used 'illegal methods'

Updated: 2006-02-22 08:45

TURIN, Italy - The scandal surrounding a disgraced Austrian ski coach deepened Tuesday as team officials said two Olympic athletes may have engaged in "illegal methods" and potentially damaging new details emerged about what was seized in a surprise raid on the team's living quarters.

Peter Schroeksnadel, the President of the Austrian Ski Federation, left, and Markus Gandler, chief of the Austrian Cross Country skiing team, pause during a press conference at the Austria House in Sestriere, Italy Tuesday Feb. 21, 2006. Austrian officials held a press conference Tuesday after Italian investigators paid a return visit to the Austrian ski team targeted in anti-doping raids at the Winter Olympics, prompting the head of the nation's ski federation to angrily call for authorities to produce evidence to justify the continuing scrutiny. [AP]

The saga unfolded as Austrian ski officials faced mounting evidence that banned ski coach Walter Mayer may have brought a major doping scandal upon them.

It was revealed that evidence seized in the weekend raids included unlabeled drugs, a blood transfusion machine and dozens of syringes, including some in Mayer's residence.

And Austrian ski federation president Peter Schroecksnadel said that two athletes who bolted the games after the raids had confessed to a team official that they "may have used illegal methods." He did not elaborate but said the federation was setting up a commission to investigate.

Schroecksnadel also acknowledged that it was "a mistake" for the team to ever have allowed Mayer to coach in a private capacity at the Turin Games, which are taking place against the backdrop of the most rigorous drug controls in Winter Olympic history.

Meanwhile, International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said the IOC will set up a disciplinary commission, probably after the Turin games, to investigate the doping suspicions.

The unprecedented investigation was triggered when Olympic officials found that Mayer was at the games. He was banned from the Olympics for links to blood doping in 2002 in Salt Lake City.

After the initial weekend raids, investigators returned to Mayer's quarters and found more syringes. An Italian prosecutor found the additional evidence Monday night when he inspected the private home that Mayer had rented for the Olympics in the mountain hamlet of Pragelato, said Mario Pescante, an IOC member and government supervisor for the games.

On Tuesday morning, Schroecksnadel said he was incensed by the scrutiny from the World Anti-Doping Agency, the IOC and the Carbinieri paramilitary police, saying the investigation was "no longer about sport, it's just about rumors."

But by evening, Schroecksnadel had softened his indignation and said that the two Olympic athletes may have broken the rules.

Wolfgang Perner and Wolfgang Rottmann, since kicked off the team for leaving the games early, made the statement to Markus Gandler, the team's sports director, Schroecksnadel said at a news conference in the Alpine village of Sestriere.

In a series of raids conducted late Saturday on team housing in Pragelato and nearby San Sicario, police seized about 100 syringes, unlabeled medicine bottles, boxes of prescription drugs and a blood-transfusion machine, a person with direct knowledge of the investigation told The Associated Press on Tuesday. The source asked not to be identified because the investigation was ongoing.

Blood doping transfusions can be used to increase oxygen levels in the blood, which increases endurance. The source said, however, that no blood was found along with the device. Prescription drugs seized in the raid carried warning labels saying they contained banned substances, but the source said at least some members of the team had prescriptions for those.

The seized materials were still being analyzed by Italian authorities, but no test results were announced as of Tuesday.

Six skiers and four biathletes were also taken for drug screens by the IOC as a part of the raid, and the IOC had not yet announced results of those tests.

Five-time Olympian Ludwig Gredler, a member of Austria's biathlon team, said the team has no choice but submit to the searches.

"These are the laws of Italy and we have to follow them," he said. "Team Austria is a small group and we live in close proximity to each other, but naturally I can't know what happens in other rooms. I know I'm clean and have taken nothing, but I can't speak for my teammates."

Mayer fled the Turin area and headed for Austria sometime after the Saturday raids. He resurfaced the next night, when he crashed his car into a police blockade just 15 miles inside his native country's border with Italy, some 250 miles from Turin.

Schroecksnadel said police took Mayer to a psychiatric facility, where he was staying because it was feared he might commit suicide. Mayer appeared Tuesday in an Austrian court, where he pleaded guilty to charges of civil disorder, assault and damage to property.

"It is a saga," Rogge said of Mayer's bizarre flight. "Not even Hollywood could come up with a scenario like it."

Though Mayer had been in Italy coaching the team in a private capacity, IOC medical commission chief Arne Ljungqvist said his presence — while not breaking any rules — had violated the "spirit" of his Olympic ban.

Mayer was banned from the Turin Games and the 2010 Games in Vancouver after blood transfusion materials were found at the Salt Lake City Games. The Austrians claimed it was used for ultraviolet radiation of blood to treat and prevent colds and flu.

Saturday's raids, the first ever by police on athletes at the Olympics, occurred amid enormous scrutiny of athletes for any possible signs of doping.

Only one athlete, Russian biathlon star Olga Pyleva, has been thrown out of the games for doping so far.

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