November 14, 2011 (Finland) – Finnish TV channel YLE and Norwegian broadcaster NRK are reporting that Finnish national team member Juha Lallukka is suspected of doping, following a positive result for Human Growth Hormone from a sample taken earlier this fall while in training.

The Finnish Ski Federation concedes the positive test but will not confirm the identity of the athlete until the B sample has been tested. According to YLE sources, however, the athlete is indeed Lallukka.

Lallukka, who has 19 World Cup starts to his credit, was a somewhat surprising 8th place finisher in the men’s 50k at the World Championships in Oslo last March, where he was also a member of Finland’s men’s 4x10k relay team, which placed 4th. At 32 years of age, Lallukka has only one previous individual top 10 result prior to Oslo, a 4th place in Lahti back in 2004.

Lallukka, described as a “lone wolf” by NRK’s Torgeir Bjorn, has been training apart from the national team since the end of last season. Scheduled to race  at the Finnish season opener in Muonio this past weekend, Lallukka was a no show, reportedly due to illness.

The head of the Finnish national team, Magnar Dalen, insisted that the Finnish system is clean and expressed hope that the B sample would come out negative. “I can guarantee that there is no organized doping within the Finnish ski team, I can absolutely guarantee it,” he is reported as saying to NRK.

However, Dalen declined to take responsibility for the behaviour of athletes who operate outside the supervision of the national team: “What athletes do off the national team in their own groups, we have very little opportunity to control.” Dalen also declared to NRK  that, “If an athlete is caught doping, he never operates alone. There must also be people in the background and they must come forward.” Juha Vanhanen, Lallukka’s manager, professed no knowledge of HGH use by the athlete and declined further comment when reached by YLE.

The Lallukka positive test puts the Finnish system under a cloud of suspicion once again, one which it had being trying to escape since the cross-country ski world was rocked by the news of systemic doping by Finnish athletes at the 2001 world championships in Lahti. The positive test also reminds the ski community of the tragic figure of Mika Myllylla, the tarnished Finnish star who eventually admitted to doping in Lahti, and who died suddenly last July at the age of 41.

Members of the current national team have expressed shock and concern at the news of Lallukka’s positive test. Rising star, Krista Lahteenmaki told the Finnish newspaper Ilta Sanomat, “I am totally shocked about this … and was close to crying. It seems incredible that Finnish cross-country skiing is once again in such a stir … I am scared and worried, above all on behalf of the sponsors.” Recently retired national team veteran, Pirjo Muranen, who now commentates for YLE, called the news “earth-shattering”.

See the YLE report HERE.
Read NRK’s report HERE.
Read the Itla Sanomat report HERE.