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October 15, 2012 – Dear Editorial Staff, I was sent a link to your article posted on skitrax.com regarding the supplement Hero. Your reporting was fair and even-handed, and I appreciate you pointing out the fact that the company’s website speaks prominently about the product not being intended for use by competitive athletes. – read article HERE.
Because the company makes only homeopathic products that are diluted many thousands of times and are not intended for use by competitive athletes, we never thought that this would be a concern for the competitive athletic community, but it seems that we may have been wrong.
The image of US Skiing and the US Ski Team is important to me. They have worked very hard to establish a reputation as an organization promoting clean competition and with zero tolerance for the use of banned substances. I am not currently a USSA member and have not coached for a couple of years, but given my continued involvement and visibility in the nordic community, I understand people’s concern regarding my involvement with Hero.
After much consideration, last week, I decided to dissolve any and all relationship between myself and Hero, effective immediately.
I’m saddened to see people posting comments about the integrity of skiers from Idaho. This company was created after I had retired from coaching and there is no reason for those athletes to have their hard work and commitment called in to question. They are committed, ethical athletes and they do not deserve to have that status challenged simply because they line in the same state as I do.
The error in judgment was mine and mine alone.
Thank you for your consideration.
Travis Jones
October 16th, 2012 at 1:11 pm
First I’m surprised by the fact that there are no comments by anyone–not coaches, not parents, sport administrators or anyone from the competitive ski population. This is how the whole drug thing got out of control in the first place, way back in the 70s—nobody would speak out and the effort to close the barn door was one hell of a battle and still is.
I commend Travis for coming forward and dissolving his relationship with Hero/(S)Hero, but my big question is, what has happened to the company? Has there been any effort to dissolve Hero, or is the wolf still in the chicken coop.I can tell you, they can make all the disclaimers they want to, but that doesn’t stop anyone from making an order and getting themselves started on their program.
Here is an story of how you can get caught up in the trap http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/15/sports/runner-christian-hesch-describes-doping-with-epo.html
I’m hopeful that WADA and USADA are aware of Hero and the potential for more Hero’s and what this means to them—there is money out there on the multiple levels of racing that take place in the world and that is the bait. This will call for more testing at any number of races all over the world and not just the usual random test(4-5 racers from the top 20 skiers), as many of these races have hundreds, thousands of racers in them now a days.
The new cat is out of the bag and could be a real handful to contain.
I think we need federal and state laws to control these public distrbution networks. Where illegal drugs are for purchase, as they will continue to grow in numbers and will not be as kind as Hero was in warning the racing population.
This is a scary one.
October 19th, 2012 at 2:14 am
Marty, what’s your take on Lance Armstrong?