Syringes found in Austrian coach’s home

A DISGRACED Austrian ski coach left behind syringes in the home he rented for the Turin Olympics, and more details were revealed yesterday about what was seized in a surprise weekend raid on the living quarters of athletes and staff - including unlabeled drugs and a blood transfusion machine.

An Italian prosecutor inspected the private home in the mountain hamlet of Pragelato on Monday night, where banned coach Walter Mayer had been staying before he bolted the Olympics following the raids and resurfaced in Austria, police said yesterday.

Mario Pescante, IOC member and government supervisor for the games, said that syringes were found during the search. Turin Carabinieri paramilitary police spokesman Roberto Cicatelli stressed that the inspection was not considered a second raid, since no one was staying in the home when it was entered.

In a series of raids conducted late Saturday on team housing in Pragelato and nearby San Sicario, police seized about 100 syringes, unlabeled medicine bottles, boxes of prescription drugs and a blood-transfusion machine.

Transfusions can be used to oxygenate the blood before competition, which increases endurance. The source said, however, that no blood was found along with the device. Prescription drugs found in the raid carried warning labels saying they contained banned substances, but the source said at least some members of the team had prescriptions for those.

The seized materials were still being analysed by Italian authorities.

Six skiers and four biathletes were taken for drug screens by the IOC as a part of the raid, and IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies said a detailed statement would be released only in the event of positive tests. She did say, however, that in this case the IOC would give an indication of when the process was completed.

Austria’s ski federation president, Peter Schroecksnadel, was incensed by the continued scrutiny. “I think they’re going too far with the whole thing,” Schroecksnadel said. “This is not sport ... We won’t live with this. We can’t have our guys going through this. It’s no longer about sport, it’s just about rumours.”

Schroecksnadel challenged the authorities behind the investigation to justify their methods, suggesting that they returned to the Austrians’ living quarters only because the first sweep had not yielded any evidence of doping.

“Why are the results not here from the guys who were tested?” he said. “They find nothing, this is why they’re still breaking into the apartments, because they haven’t found anything. They keep coming back. I don’t agree with the way they’re doing things with this, even if it is the state.”

International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said the IOC was waiting for information from Italian authorities on the results of the investigation and was not alarmed by the police’s return to Austrian housing.

“I find it logical for the police authorities to look for possible illegal material or drugs in another private accommodation of the Austrian team,” he said.