"The Tour seems to be missing the key component of an affective testing program--transparency."
/Rex Hoggard at GolfChannel.com explains why the revelation of Bhavik Patel's PED violation was not only unsatisfactory, but strangely lacking in the primary detail: what PED was used.
Since we learned that information in the Doug Barron case, why not in this one?
Although the Tour’s original PED manual in 2008 stated, "... the PGA Tour will, at a minimum, publish the name of the player, the anti-doping rule violation, and the sanction imposed,” for a performance-enhancing violation, that policy was amended in January 2009 when “the anti-doping violation” wording was removed from the policy.
However subtle the reworded policy may seem, it only serves to further extend a cloak of secrecy that has defined the anti-doping program since its inception.
**Here is the Mark Lamport-Stokes piece referenced in Hoggard's report and vital reading if you are an Olympic hopeful trying to keep the various drug protocols straight.
"What's going to be key is a full understanding of the differences, how that impacts a clean player and making sure a clean player has an opportunity to be successful," United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) chief Travis Tygart told Reuters. "The WADA code has things like the beta-2s (agonists that are used to treat asthma and other pulmonary disorders) that are going to be different than what the current (PGA Tour) list looks like. "So we are going to have a full and fruitful opportunity to educate those athletes that may fall under our jurisdiction, just like we do with the NBA (National Basketball Association) players who come in to play in the Olympics."