By William Breathes
When it comes to performance-enhancing drugs, the World Anti-Doping Agency has a hard line: keep it clean.
And like a growing surge of people across the world, they understand that marijuana is not a performance-enhancing drug and that a few recreational (or medical) puffs of ganja when not in competition aren’t going to harm anyone.
The agency – which started in 1999 – is huge, and covers the international level of just about every sport you can imagine from well known sports like hockey and soccer to oddball endeavors like korfball and pelota. They set the rules that the International Olympic Committee follows and even mixed martial arts organizations have adopted the WADA standards.
The WADA new threshold is 150 nanograms per milliliter of blood of THC carboxy, the metabolite of THC that can stay in your fatty tissue for up to a month after use.
The decision was made at at a Word Anti Doping Agency executive committee meeting May 11 and all blood samples dated then on will be subject to the new guidelines. It also advises its member sporting associations to not go after current cases that would fall under the new guidelines, “as a matter of fairness and to provide consistency.”
While not outright allowing cannabis use, the new threshold means athletes could take a few puffs of chronic weeks out from competition and fall under the allowable limit by the time of their match, game, race, fight, etc. Anyone who puffs up until their event will still be busted and likely face sanctions.
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http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2013/05/international_sports_anti-doping_rules_relaxed_for_marijuana_use.php