Meeting My Fellow DCOs

Got up early and took a taxi to the NAC. Traffic was a zoo (even though cars are now limited to odd/even based on license plate), but I left early enough. I ran into the NAC DC Manager who I met on Wednesday, and he showed me how to check in when I entered the facility and get my lunch pass. We began the morning with a two-hour meeting – in Chinese. The DCO with whom I will be paired Feng) sat next to me in the back of the room and would translate when something important was said. The DC Manager of the Aquatics Center asked me to get in front of the group and introduce myself and my background. The DCOs are young doctors and the chaperones (the ones who notify the athletes that they have been selected for drug testing and escort them to the station to the DCOs) are medical students and other college students, and their English is very good. Several came up to me afterwards to ask me questions about pharmacy and UCSF. Then we had a meeting just for the 12 DCOs at the NAC, and the head of the meeting stated that they agreed to hold the meeting in English out of respect for me.

Next we had lunch – McDonalds again! – but a number of the female DCOs brought food from home and they all wanted me to try theirs. I was trying to be careful about what I ate, as I was warned that if I can’t peal it or cook it, then don’t eat it. Many of them brought fresh vegetables that they wanted me to try, so I would try small bites.

After that, I began training with the new collection kits and forms. Some of the athletes will be tested additionally for EPO, which requires both a urine and blood sample. I was amazed that they are still using a paper system, with is prone to people making many mistakes in transcription, reading handwriting and so forth. They were very surprised when I told them that we have a paperless system with a handheld computer and scanner when we do NCAA drug testing – just scan ID cards and bar codes and the names and ID numbers, etc. are automatically entered in to the computer. Hmmm. You would think the Olympic system would be the most advanced system.

I had to leave at 1:30 to go to the DC Command center for a meeting, but I had no idea what the meeting was all about. I had to get a special pass to get in, and when I got upstairs, the room had a big table with people sitting around it with name cards, and a larger group sitting in the back of the room. I took a seat in the back of the room and someone came up to me and told me that I had a place at the table, and sure enough, there was a name card for me. It turned out the meeting was for all the international DCOs and was run by the head of the Anti-doping program. I recalled that his name and email address was the one given to me by my colleague at the Anti-doping Research Lab in Los Angeles when I first told her that I was looking for a contact. She got me right to the top. There were about 8-10 International DCOs who were representing their country’s anti-doping organizations (and were being paid to attend) and only 6 international DCOs recruited by BOCOG; me being one of the six. Also, I was definitely the only American DCO; no one was there from USADA. I met several people I had met at the Sydney Games. The International DCOs were from Canada, Norway, UK, Australia, and Greece that I recall. A very friendly group. We were told that there will be 4500 tests conducted and 633 that include EPO. There are a total of 197 DCOs. A fair amount of the meeting was to discuss policies and procedures, and I finally met Xuan, the International Doping Control Coordinator, who had been my Beijing contact while I was home.

I happened to see the Anti-doping Laboratory, but it was heavily guarded by soldiers with weapons and fenced off, and my credentials did not allow me access. I am sensitive to the high security, so I asked a soldier if I could take a picture (“asking” meant bowing and showing him my DC credentials and camera and pointing to the building). He nodded “yes” after thinking about it and pointed to where he wanted me to stand inside the fence.

After the meeting, a group of us went to an area of Beijing called Houhai (“Oh Hi”) and it was quite crowded, but had a lake where people were swimming, paddle boating and fishing, and had many shops and restaurants all around. The lights and lanterns were very colorful. We went to a Vietnamese restaurant and the food and company were great. I found out that I had tomorrow (Saturday) off because they were evacuating the NAC to sweep for explosives. So, I have tomorrow off and I found out that two others did too, so I asked if they wanted to do something tomorrow. So, we are tentatively planning to go to the Forbidden City. Been a long day.