Coach of suspended sprinter faces punishment following investigation
Track and field's global anti-doping body suspended a high-profile American high school coach Tuesday after alleging he possessed a banned substance that three of his athletes — including suspended record-breaking sprint phenom Issam Asinga — tested positive for within a 13-month span.
After an investigation alongside the United States Anti-Doping Agency, the Athletics Integrity Unit handed Monteverde Academy Coach Gerald Phiri a provisional suspension. The AIU alleged Phiri possessed multiple banned drugs that modulate metabolism and failed to 'cooperate with the investigation by providing false and inaccurate information.'
The AIU said it opened an investigation after three of Phiri's athletes tested positive for GW1516 — a drug, known as cardarine, that alters how the body metabolizes fat — between July 2023 and August 2024. The AIU alleged that Phiri, a former Zambian Olympian, possessed GW1516 as an athlete in 2018 and 2019 and possessed meldonium, another banned metabolism drug, in 2024.
Phiri plans to appeal the suspension, Montverde Sports Information Manager Michael Damon said in an emailed statement.
In July 2023, when he was a sprinter at Montverde, Asinga tested positive for GW1516, which nullified his under-20 world record in the 100 meters and cost him a chance to compete at last year's Paris Olympics for Suriname, his father's native country and the flag he chose to compete under.
World Athletics suspended Asinga in May last year. Asinga's final appeal will be heard later this year at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland. The case is expected to be heard in April, according to public filings.
Asinga sued Gatorade last summer, claiming he had ingested GW1516 through a contaminated package of energy gummies given to him at a Gatorade awards ceremony. (A lab tested the gummies and informed the AIU that they returned positive for GW1516.) Asinga also claimed the gummies were labeled falsely as certifiably tested and that Gatorade delayed in providing Asinga materials he could have used to prove his innocence.
Gatorade called the claims 'false.' The lawsuit remains ongoing in the Southern District of New York. Gatorade filed a motion to dismiss the suit in early January. Asinga's lawyers responded in filings that the motion should be denied and 'Issam's claims should move to discovery, where he can begin to learn more about how and why his life became derailed by Gatorade's dangerous product.'
Phiri joined Montverde Academy, a Florida prep school known for its elite athletic program, as an assistant coach in 2018 and became the head track and field coach in 2021. Phiri ran collegiately for Texas A&M and represented Zambia at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics.
'As this is an ongoing investigation, we have not been provided with any substantive details at this time,' Damon said in the statement. 'In compliance with the suspension, Coach Phiri will also be suspended from Montverde Academy and will not have any personal contact with our student-athletes pending the outcome of the investigation.'
GW1516 is illegal for use in food or medication in the United States. According to USADA, it was pulled from clinical trials after it caused cancer when tested on animals.
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